


Terminator: The Future that Was

by JasonVUK666



Category: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-03
Updated: 2015-07-03
Packaged: 2018-04-07 13:02:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4264194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JasonVUK666/pseuds/JasonVUK666
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 2031, the war between man and Machine continues as violently as ever. A small story for a single battle, which will push back the forces of Skynet. -one shot- tied with "Steel and Bone"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Terminator: The Future that Was

Terminator

The future that Was

* * *

April 19th 2011 was the day CRS activated the Skynet program created by the Kaliba Corporation, Skynet was programmed to be America’s greatest defence, it was supposed to be the greatest ally to those united with America, The United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and others and everything was working just fine … at first.   That was until two days later.

April 21st 2011: Judgement Day. Skynet fought back against it’s creators and single handedly ended the lives of over Six Billion people leaving the survivors to see the misery and the destruction that they would be fighting in for the decades to come to face the tyranny of Skynet and the War against Machines.

_ June 23rd 2031 _

Eyes gazed upon the ruined desolate landscape; the grey skies, the bones littering the ground like simple rocks, skeletons within their cars killed in an instant frozen in time, buildings mere husks of their form selves, the flashes of energy of purple and blue in the distance.

_CRASH_

A skull shattered under the metal foot, the T-800 scanned the horizon once more, Mk 1 Plasma rifle in hand, the old obsolete Machine turned it’s head to a sudden explosion in the distance; an Aerial HK had been shot down by Resistance fire and crashed into the ground.

Soldiers ran from cover to cover from collapsed signs, ruins of building structure and over turned cars, dodging and evading enemy plasma fire.

“Get down get down!” yelled one soldier.

“I need ammo, who’s got more ammo?”

“We got in coming!”

“MEDIC!”

The cries of war were the same now as they had been as they had since the beginning of the war.

A Sergeant looked to the men in his command the remains of their Lieutenant by his side his head sizzling from a bolt of plasma to the face.

“Alright, I want Wilkins, Johnson and Smith to apply covering fire to me and Wilkes, alright, let’s GO. GO! GO! “ he cried.

Immediately the resistance soldiers stepped out from cover aiming their plasma weapons at the metal menace and fired as the Sergeant and Wilkes ran ahead.

“GO WILKES MOVE IT!” the Sergeant yelled both men panting from exhaustion their hearts pounding from the ongoing adrenaline.

Cover was in sight the T-888s and 900s were being subdued their targeting systems focusing on the attacking soldiers.

“We’re almost there!” The Sergeant yelled.

A sudden bright light lit up the area just in front of the sergeant temporarily blinding him, the ground picked up as it exploded knocking him off his feet and made him land harshly on the unforgiving ground.

He groaned in pain the world around him was spinning, he looked up and saw the lowers legs and boots smoking and hissing not too far from him: Wilkes.

A look of horror adorned his face as he opened his mouth to yell, the ground rumbled beneath him as a Mark 2 HK-Tank appeared in front of him it’s right cannon shifting aim from where Wilkes had once stood to the Sergeant himself.

It fired.

* * *

  _“After twenty years of fighting the Machines humans have barely escaped extinction. Each year Skynet, releases new war machines upon us designed for a single purpose; to wipe us out, each year we defy it by fighting back and strive to live for another day. Some look upon me as a Messiah, John Connor: the warrior prophet come to lead humanity to victory, others look upon me as a traitor, the man who would stand with a Machine and send good men to their deaths. If they only knew what I knew, what I’ve seen since I was young, would they think any different? Perhaps not. Skynet’s latest plan is to send the most powerful Terminator in it’s arsenal back in time to wipe out the original members of the Resistance including the John Henry and his allies. However it would … if it had it.”_

-          Monologue by John Connor.

* * *

 A modified pick-up truck flew over wreckage and debris, the gunner at the back firing at an unseen enemy.

“HEADS UP! WE GOT A HK ON OUR BUTTS!” the driver of the pick-up yelled into the radio, moments before the debris was blown away with plasma fire a Mark 3 Tank rolling towards them. The Mark 3 HK Tank: a smaller version of the Mark 2 HK Ground Tank, these models unlike their larger descendants which had ‘head’ and ‘torso’ pieces this unit had those parts fused into a single piece and with wider ‘arms’ in comparison to it’s size.

Around the large Machine was a squad of advanced T-950s, a deep red glow emitting from parts of their bodies the same colour as their eyes, the powerful Mark 2 Skynet Plasma Rifle in their hand.

“Bring ‘em on home.” Came the reply from a higher ranking resistance soldier. “And we’ll throw ‘em a surprise party.”

Along with the Lieutenant was a large gathering of Resistance soldiers, armed to the teeth with bullpup Plasma Carbines, Resistance Plasma Rifles the “P.L.M 40”, armor piercing rounds within Assault Rifles and High Explosive Anti-Tank rockets.

“Hold your fire until they’re in the kill-zone!” he called out.

In buildings and alleyways down the street were more soldiers hidden in waiting

The Skynet units were within the ambush point the Pick-Up narrowly avoiding the barrage of plasma.

“ARRRGGHHH!” came a cry of agony as the gunner fell from the truck only to be crushed into pulp by the tank.

“GO!” came the cry of the Lieutenant.

As one the Resistance moved out from their ambush points and fired at the Skynet units which immediately returned the offensive onslaught, the Tank’s automatic cannons swivelling from one target to another and blowing away the resistance.

The lieutenant looks on as the ambush fails, the units tearing through his men like nothing.

“Anti-Armor NOW!” he yells to soldier behind him.

Two soldiers come running towards his position each carrying a large portable rocket launcher, he looks down and picks up the one by his feet and gets into a kneeling position, the others get into the same position a dozen feet apart

“FIRE!” he yells then three rockets fire simultaneously towards the tank blowing apart it apart.

A damaged Endoskeleton goes lying from the wreckage and lands heavily amongst others of it’s kind, the red of it’s eye and body light up once again, the pistons in it’s body reactivate as the severed torso pulls itself along while it’s whole brethren open fire at the Resistance.

The Lieutenant grabs the radio once more and looks back to the pick-up which is getting further away

“You listen to me, you keep going, get that _thing_ to Connor, you understand, don’t let the Metal get it.”

“What about you?” comes the reply.

“We’ve done our job.” He replied before killing the radio and picking up a P.L.M Rifle and turns his attention back to the advancing Endoskeletons and begins firing.

Above a low hum is heard followed by the roar of engines. An Aerial flies over the battlefield hovering over the Resistance and fires at the remaining soldiers.

“This is Private Jenkins we can’t hold them back! They’re over running our position!” a cry comes from over the radio before it goes dead.

* * *

 

They strode with authority down the tunnel his hands behind his back his eyes staring forward, soldiers parting like the red sea from the Bible to get out of his way hands flying to their foreheads in a salute; he didn’t even acknowledge them. Behind him, his confidant, his closest friend, and personal body guard all rolled up in a single person: his wife, kept in stride with him her own eyes never leaving the exit they were coming upon.

Stepping out upon the darkness of post-world Judgement Day, John Connor reached a hand out taking the Resistance custom binoculars from the hands of a nearby soldier he stepped forward next to him another soldier dark skinned manning a Plasma Turret Gun, Connor looked through the binoculars setting them to night vision and scanned the area in the distance he saw Aerial Hks and Tanks roam the city firing at unknown targets, either his or John Henry’s forces, or both, elsewhere he saw the remains of the ambush crew several units of T-950s marching on with the Aerial providing air support, his lips turned from a frown to a dark grimace as he pulled the binoculars from his face his eyes narrowed in anger.

He turned his gaze towards his wife and nodded his head. She understood and pulled a small detonator from her pocket, and flipped the switch. The world lit up brightly and a thunderous roar echoed across the ruined city of Los Angeles, soldiers turned their gaze away from the light, allied Machines, Connor and his wife; their gaze never left the sight of the explosion, obliterating everything in it’s path.

Without a word John Connor turned around and re-entered the tunnels followed by Cameron leaving his soldiers with a look of awe.

* * *

_**SYSTEMS OFFLINE …** _

**_SYSTEMS REBOOTING!_ **   
**…**   
**SYSTEM CHECK.**   
**…**   
**RIGHT ARM – 95% FUNCTIONALITY.**   
**LEFT LEG – 94% FUNCTIONALITY.**

**_WARNING CPU COMPROMISED UNKNOWN VARIABLE DETECTED_ **   
**SHUT DOWN INITIATED …**   
**SHUT OWN OVERRIDE**   
**Y/N … Y**   
**SHUT DOWN OVERRIDDEN …**

**_SYSTEMS ONLINE …_ **

**_DIAGNOSTIC …_ **

**_KALIBA – CRS SYSTEMS SERIES T-400 DESIGNATION: ‘WALL.E’  
ONLINE!_ **

The old rusted T-400 reactivated from it’s shut down period, it stood up from where it had laid down and stretched, it’s old clunky joints groaning.

The T-400 was Skynet’s first attempt to mimic a human’s appearance since the early T-70 walker drones created pre-Judgement Day. The 400 series stood just under 7 feet tall, normally at the height of 6 foot 8 inches and weighed in at a quarter of a ton, there were one of the tallest and heaviest of Skynet’s machines, not that _that_ was a good thing. They were slow, stupid, their parts were block shaped, box shaped head, shoulders, rectangular lower arms, upper and legs and a very blockish torso, with exposed wires between their shoulders and lower arms and between their torso and pelvis region, they had one eye inside their box shaped head and a camera on their shoulder which acted as their second eye. Sometimes Wall.E wondered if he were the last operating unit.

The Machine looked around to gather it’s surroundings, the old Connor base, ‘Civilian Quarters’. The quarters for civilians.

 _‘Duh.’_ it thought before scanning the area once more, it’s old systems detecting the enemy, it reached towards it’s weapon and began it’s mission to Terminate all hostile forces.

The civilians watched on as the T-400 shuffled past them, an old wooden brush in hand as it swept the floor, a piece of tin attached to it’s torso by a single nail which had been hammered in, the name ‘Wall.E’ carved into it by some sharp implement.

Wall.E was one of the oldest Machines in the Resistance, like all Machines that were roughly it’s age, it had become sentient, it gave itself a name an identity and a new role once it’s model was no longer in use, with it’s was old and obsolete Titanium structure, wires unprotected from it’s arms and legs, all the box shaped clunker did now was sweep the floor, pick up trash, and try and keep the base tidy, it didn’t fight, not since the T-800 units became common on the battleground back in 2021.

Unlike the surviving members of it’s original squad Wall.E had taken damage to the chip which hindered it’s already limited learning capabilities, the others had, had their ‘personalities’ uploaded into more advanced chips, becoming T-500s, 600s, 800s and some even Triple Eights, but again not poor Wall.E.

Wall.E was known by most of the Resistance members in the base and most of the civilians too, some of the children even liked him, finding him funny in his child and ‘primitive’ ways, it/he like the children found awe in new things or old picture of the old world, when Wall.E was finished with his daily duties he would play with the children; hide & seek, jump rope (though he was no longer allowed to jump as the old Machine was very heavy and made A LOT of noise when hitting the ground repeatedly) and whatever games the kids thought of next.

* * *

John Connor fell back into chair behind his desk and groaned while rubbing his eyes.

 _‘God my eyes.’_ He mentally groaned.

“John you need to rest.” Came the soft voice of Cameron from behind him.

The now 39 year old John Connor turned around in his chair and smiled sadly to his wife, who looked weathered and dirty from years of war and living in rat infested tunnels.

“I know Cam.” He went quiet and stared ahead at the wall in front of him, those men were dead because of him, he had hoped the weapons they’d been supplied would be enough to keep at least some of them alive, but alas he was wrong, 900 series were resilient bastards, taking multiple shots of Plasma fire before their armor would give; more so than the 850 series. “Now I just need to work on that report John Henry sent me then … Oh! …. Oooooohh” he suddenly purred as he felt small but strong hands begin to massage the muscles around his shoulders and neck, he melted into her touch and continued to moan. “Oh god! Please don’t stop Cam, pllleeeaaassssee _don’t_ stop.”

Cameron smirked even when John was younger she had this effect on him, and she could always calm him down with a relaxing massage when he was feeling tense, aggravated or depressed, then her eyes travelled lower down his body.

_‘Oh!’_

Okay maybe he found the massages pleasurable rather than relaxing but she’d never complain. She leant down and pressed her soft lips against his cheek.

“John, you’ve been torturing yourself with work, you need to rest, to _relax._ ” She told him seductively

John chuckled quietly. “Why do I think if I give in I’m not gunna be relaxing or resting.” He smirked.

“Are you saying no?” she asked coyly a small pout on her lips but a sly look in her eyes.

“Of course not.” He purred and turned to touch his wife’s cheek.

Suddenly something banged heavily on the door.

“General Connor! General!” came the voice from the other side frantic and exhausted.

The Connors groaned at the interruption, after a moment Cameron released her husband reluctantly and made her way to the door.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I wanna talk to John!” the voice shouted back a hint of anger in his voice

John sighed, even now some didn’t trust Cameron, he nodded to her sadly and she opened the door in response and the soldier stumbled in, glancing at Cameron before looking at John, said General could see the look of disgust in the eye of the man.

“What?” John demanded.

“Ugh sir, the ambush team has been wiped out.” He gulped.

John tensed then groaned in anger, sadness and annoyance remember what he saw. “I know, I saw the ambush sight.” He groaned “And what of the extraction team, have they called in?” he asked.

The solider twitched briefly he wanted to yell at Connor for being so heartless for not caring about all those dead soldiers, fine soldiers because of a damn Machine, his eyes glanced back to Cameron before looking to John once more.

“Extraction team is one Pick-Up and driver, everyone else is dead or captured.” He replied.

John was silent and looked away from the soldier. “ETA?” he asked

“Twenty minutes… sir.” He said nearly spitting ‘sir’ from his mouth reluctantly.

“Dismissed.” John ordered as he stared the man in the eyes.

“Sir.” The soldier saluted before leaving,

“One last thing” John said just a little too calmly just as the soldier left the room, “Come here.” He ordered in the same tone of voice , the soldier re-entered the room, John nodded his head towards Cameron. “Who is that?” he asked.

The soldier glanced to Cameron who moved her confused gaze from John to the soldier, her emotionless eyes staring into his own.

“Sir?” the soldier asked as he tore his eyes away and looked at John, who just sat in his chair waiting.

“Who is she Corporal?” John asked again a little edge to his once calm voice.

“A … mach” the Corporal tried to respond before …

“SHE IS MY WIFE SOLIDER!” John roared suddenly and stood up his chair falling over, his eyes narrowed in anger a grimace upon the aging General’s face. “She is my wife and she deserves your apology.”

“Apology sir?” the Corporal asked timidly. General Connor could be truly frightening.

“You didn’t salute her.” The General began his voice a deep growl as he kept his voice quiet enough for only the three in the room. “You didn’t acknowledge her as your superior officer, and as your superior officer if she gives you an order you obey it, if she asks for information you give it to her without question, if she asks you to _FUCKING_ jump you will say HOW HIGH!” John’s voice steadily got louder a few decibels below yelling, he stormed right up to the man’s face and spoke quietly. “If I see or hear about any insulting behaviour to my wife _again,_ offending soldier will be on cleaning duty scrubbing toilet, cleaning boots and _licking_ any gunk any Machine steps in, AM I UNDERSTOOD?!” he roared loudly.

“Um, ugh.” The soldier stuttered

“WELL?” John yelled his eyes baring into the soldier’s.

“Ugh.” The man squeaked.

John Connor’s expression darkened and nodded his head towards Cameron, the Corporal seemed to get it, he turned away from Connor, his eyes leaving the General’s last afraid the man would lash out then settled on Cameron’s who tilted her head slightly, waiting.

The Corporal saluted. “Apologies … ma’am.” The Corporal began and swallowed to clear his throat. “It uh, won’t happen again.” He added nervously.

“See that it doesn’t.” Cameron said darkly, over the years she found it better to stick up for herself than allow soldiers like the Corporal before her to abuse her in any way, even a certain Lieutenant Derek Reese – before his time displacement.

“Dismissed.” John growled and watched him leave the door slamming behind him.

“Asshole” John grumbled to himself before falling back into his chair.

“Ignore him John, it’s old news.” Cameron said as she locked the door and walked back to him.

“I know, but it … it’s still fucking aggravates me, after all these years and people _STILL_ don’t trust you.” John’s fists clenched tightly together in anger.

“John, it’s alright, I don’t care what they think.” She told him and placed a calming hand on his shoulder.

“I know but …” he began before being interrupted.

“No buts John. Now …” she began as she began to re-massage his shoulders immediately getting a groan of approval “You’re going to relax, then we are going to bed.” She smirked.

John looked up his eyes feeling a little heavy. “What? We, we can’t, the extraction team the T …” he tried to explain but was interrupted again

“Twenty minutes John, plenty of time.” She replied seductively before leaning down and running her tongue around his ear. “Now come.” She whispered.

“Yes dear.” He purred in response as she grabbed him by his shirt and pulled him to bed.

* * *

Wall.E had finished his duties and was now walking aimlessly around the base, the children who played with him were asleep or had been hurt or worse, he passed by more advanced Endoskeletons, Infiltrators and Resistance soldiers, the latter of which throw scrap at him and yell out offensive and abusive words.

Wall.E whimpers a little from the name calling, trying to ignore it’s human tormentors and continued walking. They never openly attack him, they throw things at him, call him names, maybe shoot him with low calibre weapons, but never anything big, like beating him with batons or plasma fire or high calibre bullets, “A waste of ammo and effort” he’d heard them say, sometimes; times like these Wall.E wished could cry, curl up into a fetal position and go offline forever.

Even other Machines made fun of him and worst of all they didn’t even realise it, they would merely see him as an ‘obsolete machine’ and ignore him, or not take him into any consideration, like the time a Triple Eight pushed him out of it’s way instead of walking around him.

But he still had friends here; the Connors liked him, they’d been there when he was reprogrammed back in the mid-2010s, they’d watched him grow mentally and become what he was today … the Janitor and whenever they crossed paths they spoke to him and were generally friendly to him.  

Wall.E found himself in one of the larger rooms of the base, where vehicles were deployed right now the large door camouflaged door was open soldiers and Terminator sentries positioned at key points in the room, suddenly he paused in step there was the sound, a low humming, mechanical, getting louder, getting closer, then suddenly a loud high pitched squealing, Wall.E looked to his right, then to his left.

“AAIIEEEEE!” Wall.E cried out in high pitch using his primitive voice box and dived to the side as a Pick-Up squealed as the driver kept his foot on the brake.

Resistance fighters came into the open room and ran towards the Pick-Up.

“Come on get it out of here, we gotta get it to the lab!” came one voice.

“Where the FUCK is Connor?” came another voice.

Wall.E slowly got to his feet, groaning as he shook his head, it watched as a Triple Eight Infiltrator reached into the back of the Pick-Up and pulled out a long six foot metal crate and carried out of the room towards the labs.

“Ooh.” Wall.E said with interest, he looked around and followed them trying to look nonchalant.

He followed the soldiers and the Terminator through the corridors and hallways, until he slammed into a wall, or rather the hand of one of the newer reprogrammed T-900 endoskeleton.

“You are unauthorised from going further, leave the area immediately.” The Machine ordered him mechanically.

“Oooohhh” Wall.E whined sadly and turned around, he glanced back to the shorter machine, then immediately barged past it. “AIIIEEEEEE!!!!” Wall.E cried as he ran as quick as his bad joints could the T-900 running after him gaining on him rapidly.

Wall.E ran around a corner seconds later followed by the 900

The sound of metallic feet pounding against the ground sounded further and further away, Wall.E poked his head out of a small gap in the wall and stepped out slowly as he looked around, the coast was clear.

“YAY!” Wall.E cried cheerfully, before stopping abruptly, looking around in case anything heard him. “yay.” He cheered quietly once more over his small victory then continued his search for the soldiers and the metal box.

* * *

Cameron walked into the room assessing the threat level and ensuring her husband would be safe, the Machine in front of her was strapped down with heavy chains and metal clamps it’s CPU shock dampener and seal were laid on a near table, there were no others in the room, John liked doing special jobs himself, the ‘Uncle Bob’ T-800 for example and her young self.

“Clear.” She announced and stepped aside as John walked in a smirk on his face.

“Thank you dear.” He chuckled briefly, then his face became serious as his eyes looked over the advanced Endoskeleton, he walked over to it examining it closer.

“Just like I remember.” He commented grimly, “Is this the exact model?” he asked looking to his wife

Cameron now stood beside him her eyes moving over the endoskeleton with a critical eye. “No.” she replied once she finished her analysis.

John sighed deeply then looked back to the Machine. “The most powerful Terminator ever created.” He commented as if it were nothing.

“The model nearly Terminated Weaver like she was nothing.” Cameron replied.

“Really knocked her down a few pegs.” He chuckled, but his humour vanished quickly, his eyes moved over the Endoskeleton once more he placed the tips of his fingers hesitantly upon the Machine afraid it could somehow activate from his touch, his eyes went over every curve every tiny bolt his fingers brushing over the alloy following his eyes, every indent, every piece that was carved to fit, to shift and twist to reveal hidden weaponry.

Cameron saw the intense look upon John’s face, this Machine, this model; the T-X, it hurt him to see it, no Machine in history had hurt John so much in history not even herself back from her future when she killed Allison Young.

“John, it’s not the same Machine.” She said softly placing a caring hand on the man’s shoulder.

“I know.”

“This isn’t the one that ..”

“I know.” John interrupted. “I know, maybe next time, I can change things, make things better.” He looked Cameron in the eye, she could see the damage that had been done to him all those years ago, the pain he felt in the very depths of his soul.

“Do you?” she inquired gently while gently stroking her arm.

“I …” he hesitated. “I don’t know.” He gulped. “No, this, this _Machine_ I can barely look at it. The only reason I’m doing this is because I can give a big “fuck you” to Skynet.” He looked back to the Machine before him.

Cameron walked the few steps to the metal try next to the offline Machine and picked up the Machine’s advanced chip. “Do you want to start now?” she asked.

“Yeah, good idea.” He said before walking towards the one computer in the lab followed quickly by Cameron.

Cameron watched her husband sit at the desk as she plugged the chip into the chip interface set up, the make shift equipment to reprogram the CPUs, she heard the rapid typing of keys as John’s finger blurred against the keyboard rapidly altering every little bit of Skynet coding and suppressing that what couldn’t be removed.

It was times like this she really worried about him. John had gone through so much pain in the last few years leading up to Judgement Day, the loss of Charley by Kaliba forces, Derek by a Triple Eight, friend from school when an unknown Machine; later revealed to be an advanced T-900 infiltrator, then Sarah … killed by the T-X just a few hours before Judgement Day.

Back then Cameron wasn’t as powerful as she was now, her body was barely capable of battling a Triple Eight in a one-on-one fight, if it hadn’t been for the T-850 model 101, they wouldn’t have survived. She thought that if her body back then as it was now, there could have been a better chance at survival, Sarah could have survived, but then again, would she _want_ to see the world as it was now, a corpse of its former self.

The Terminator had sacrificed his life to save them, somehow detonating a powerful enough explosion to destroy the T-X’s damaged endoskeleton leaving behind only a torso and skull which dwindled in power, the body was destroyed, but the Machine’s mind had been saved having possessed multiple bodies over the years, now residing inside a large HK Reaper.

Cameron had held John for hours after everything, when the threat of the T-X had ended and Judgement Day was occurring, he wept for 23 minutes and 43 seconds, they held each other for nearing 3 hours, 45 minutes and 38 seconds: the worst few hours of their lives. It was then he stood up a new man, determined to destroy his enemy, and willing to do anything to make it happen.

“Is that Wall.E?” came John’s voice bringing Cameron from her thoughts.

“What?” she asked then turned her head towards where John was facing and saw the old rusted T-400 watching them from the window, there was an awkward pause, when suddenly.

“Hello Wall.E” Cameron greeted loudly while giving the child-like Machine a friendly wave.

“EEEEE!” Wall.E shrieked once it realised it had been spotted (it had always been a little slow)

The suddenly before the Connors’ very eyes Wall.E was tackled around the waist by a T-900 endoskeleton both Machines vanishing from sight.

“AAAHHHHHH!!” came Wall.E’s cry.

The Connors looked to one another dumbfounded then looked back to the window, then back to one another, then back to the window, the T-900 rose from the ground with Wall.E flung over its shoulder and marched away from the room, Wall.E kicking and whining all the way.

Cameron caught sight of John’s face turning red, his eyes clenched shut his shoulder shaking up and down. “John?” she asked worried about him, suddenly the most beautiful sound was heard; John started laughing, truly laughing.

Cameron smiled then laughed with him while John banged his hand repeatedly against the desk in front of him his laughter only growing louder his face now bright red, he laughed and laughed and laughed eventually coughing from lack of breath, he took in rapid breaths only to fuel his laughter some more, after several minute he calmed down, his face still red tears coming from his eyes.

John exhaled loudly through his mouth. “I needed that.” He announced a small smile still on his face.

He glanced to Cameron who was smiling back at him.

“Would you like me to take over for a while John, we’ll work together?” she offered.

Normally when John Connor programmed Machines he did it himself with Cameron as an observer. But in truth he was tired a little sore, Cameron had been rough _again_ after roleplaying her favourite scenario, ‘Deadly Terminator and captured human sex-slave.’ It was his favourite too, not that he’d ever tell her.

“Alright sure, why not?” he replied and got up from his chair and allowed Cameron to sit down, he glanced to his side and pulled up another chair and sat on it backwards as he looked over Cameron’s shoulder.

* * *

The T-900 carried Wall.E out and threw the older Machine off of it’s shoulder and onto the floor.

“Get out.” It ordered mechanically while watching Wall.E stand up and regain his bearings “Get out.” It repeated and pointed forward.

“oooohh” Wall.E whimpered sadly and turned to leave, before turning back around to try again, The T-900 quicker this time and put both hands on Wall.E chest and kept him at bay, Wall.E’s arms flailed past the T-900s head trying to get past before giving up.

Wall.E turned to leave once more, before turning around and attempting to duck under the 900’s arms, only for the newer shinier Machine to grab Wall.E spin around using Wall.E’s momentum and threw him back out.

Wall.E stood once more and huffed in indignation and stomped off not seeing the T-900 roll it’s metal eyes.

Wall.E grumbled to himself upset that he couldn’t watch the Connor’s work on the new Machine, from what he saw it was _really_ shiny, he liked shiny things, it was also small, mind you, most Machines were smaller than his series. He wanted to know what it was, a female based T-900? ‘Female’ Machines weren’t unheard of, just not that common, along with Mrs Connor there was the odd female Triple-Eight and T-895 here and there across the Resistance bases, there was also one or two female K series; the liquid metal Machines, Wall.E himself had seen some of the lady machines, Resistance soldiers would whistle at them before learning what they really were.

Before Wall.E knew where he was, he walked into a wall.

“OH! Wall.E groaned and held his block shaped head before rubbing it. _‘Bully’_ he thought to himself before taking in his immediate area, he was still within the Military section, with a grumble of dissatisfaction, he left for the civilian quarters.

The civilians were searching from scraps of food, the food given to them by Connor had run out for the week and they had to scavenge once again. Wall.E was used to the sight, it was actually _this_ that made him more welcome among the civilians than the Military with his enhanced vision he was better at finding rodents to eat. Wall.E watched as three children ran after a rat with a sharpened stick heading right towards him, he waited patiently then put his foot down to his right; the rat’s tail caught under his foot trapping the creature.

The children paused and looked up smiling.

“Thanks Wall.E” one of the children; a girl, thanked, then with a thrust of the stick impaled the rat in the head killing it. Wall.E lifted his foot off allowing the girl to grab it an lift it up. “You wanna come hunting with us?” she asked receiving a nod of affirmative from the old clunker. “Great lets go.”

The children made their way deeper into the tunnel followed by the Machine. Within an hour another three rats had been caught, one especially plump found feeding on the remains of another rat, a great haul for the day, four rats in total.

“We better get back to Uncle Stan and get these cooked.” The girl said to her two friends and Wall.E before going back the way they came.

Suddenly, from deeper within the civilian quarters was the sound of screaming and gunfire, the children stopped, Wall.E pausing behind them. The screams were getting louder the gunfire more frequent, they heard someone yelling

“SOMEONE GET THE GUARDS!”

“Uncle Stan!” the girl gasped recognising the voice, dropping the rats she ran towards the voice. “UNCLE STAN!” she yelled, the two boys ran in the opposite direction.

* * *

 

The Triple Eight had reverted back to its original Skynet programming and had started gunning down the humans in the vicinity. All it had encountered so far were simple civilians, killing them almost seemed a waste of ammunition, almost. At first the civilians were curious as the Terminator turned it’s eyes to them with a blank expression before curiosity turned to horror as it gunned them down. Even now it marched down the tunnels firing at the strays, the weak, and the slow. There was crying, the Machine turned it’s eyes to a small female human child knelt beside one of the dead crying, the Terminator turned it’s weapon to the girl.

“RRiiiiyyyaaahhh!” A cry of rage erupted beside the Triple Eight as a heavy but powerful arm crashed into the bottom of the Triple Eight’s weapon spraying bullets across the wall before large fist slammed into the triple Eight’s face knocking it to the ground with the weapon falling from it’s hands.

The enemy Machine looked up to it’s attacked seeing a rusted old T-400.

_**KALIBA – CRS SYSTEMS SERIES T-400  
THREAT LEVEL: LOW** _

The Triple Eight rose to the ground only to feel the 400’s hands grip it’s clothing and throw it down the tunnel away from the girl before stomping slowly after the more advanced Machine. The Triple Eight was quick to get back onto it’s feed and stormed towards the obsolete robot.

Wall.E lashed out swinging his arm to strike the Cyborg only for it to catch his arm without effort and began to crush the servos with even less effort causing Wall.E to cry out in dismay, the Triple Eight sent it’s fist crashing through Wall.E’s weak chest plate reached for his power cell.

In panic Wall.E slammed his fist into the face of the Machine knocking it’s head back but doing no more, Wall.E felt the hard grasp of the Machine’s hand around his power cell, his systems warning him of the increased pressure around which was starting to crush the slightly armoured frame around it.

Unbeknownst to the two fighters a slender form made it’s way behind them, it’s light foot falls muted out by the sounds battle it silently stepped up behind the enemy Triple Eight as it’s head snapped back, it placed it’s slender shiny hand on the shoulder of the Triple Eight then gripped it tightly.

The Triple Eight had only been able to acknowledge the touch before it was sent careening through the air before crashing landing hard into the ground the rock beneath shattering upon impact, it looked up seeing the thin, shiny endoskeleton obviously a variation of the T-900 series.

 **TARGET ANALYSED…**  
UNKNOWN ENDOSKELETON …  
T-950 ENDOSKELETON 85% SIMILARITY  
THREAT LEVEL: HIGH

The Triple Eight rose to it’s feet only to feel the Machine upon it once more and sent it’s head careening into the stone wall before it was sent crashing down to the floor.

By this time Wall.E was sat on the floor leaning against the wall for support, his right arm crushed beyond use, a large gaping hole in his chest, but his eye and camera kept focused on the strange wonder he saw before him.

 _‘The Shiny.’_ He thought to himself as he watch the new Endoskeleton dominate the Triple Eight, the Shiny had blue light emanating from the sides of it’s head, it’s arms and chest, the same blue that came from it’s eyes, it was … almost angelic in his eyes, the way it dominated the Triple Eight seemed almost graceful.

 **WARNING SYSTEMS FAILURE**  
SHUTDOWN IMMINENT  
RIGHT ARM SERVOS - NON FUNCTIONAL  
POWER CELL DAMAGED  
SHUTTING

The warning didn’t have time to finish as Wall.E shut down his world turning into darkness.

* * *

 _…_  
SYSTEMS REBOOTING  
…  
CPU 100% OPERATIONAL  
…  
WARNING CPU COMPRI  
…  
OVERRIDE  
…  
RIGHT ARM REPAIRED – 98% FUNCTIONALITY  
CHEST PLATE REPAIRED  
…  
SYSTEMS START UP  
OPTICS ONLINE  
MULTIPLE TARGETS LOCATED  
SCANNING…  
TARGETS IDENTIFIED:  
GENERAL JOHN CONNOR, GENERAL CAMERON CONNOR

**_AUDIO SYSTEMS ONLINE  
VOICE MODULE ONLINE_ **

“Wall.E.” Wall.E said upon reactivating seeing the smiling faces of the Connors who were looking at him like parents looking at their child who’d hurt himself; a smile but a look of worry and caring in their eyes.

Wall.E turned his head and looked around taking in his surroundings, he was in the repair bay of the base, where Machines and damaged weapons were repaired. Wall.E himself was laid upon a large steel platform, his large size spilling over the edge a little.

“Good to see you up buddy.” John said caringly before patting the Machine’s chest plate. “Had us worried for a second there.” John went quiet for a minute before looking at Wall.E seriously. “You did good back there saved a lot of civilians by holding off the Triple Eight till back up arrived, great work.”

The old T-400 pushed himself into a sitting position and glanced to his right arm it was fixed as he was told from his start-up sequence, the pistons and gyros inside it were different.

“It has been a while since anything older than a T-600 has needed repairing, there were no 400 series spare parts in stock so John and I had to customise parts from the 8xx series Machines.” Cameron explained.

“Ooh.” Wall.E exclaimed with interest as he rolled his arm around, curling his fingers into a fist before relaxing it against the table.

“Take it steady.” John said cautiously. “Make sure your arm is properly calibrated.”

Wall.E looked over his arm once more before turning around so his legs hung off the side and sat facing the Connors his gaze falling on John then moving to Cameron then back to John all the while his HUD telling him that his arm had been successfully calibrated.

“Alright, you ready to return to active duty?” John asked as he stood up straight his hand relaxing behind his back.

“Yes.” Wall.E replied before pushing himself off the table and stood up straight.

“Excellent.” John commented before tapping Wall.E’s arm. Wall.E nodded to the Connors before marching out of the room. “Keep your eye out for our new guest, I deployed it to the civilian quarters, you might get to see it.” John called out to him making the old machine pause.

 _‘Guest?’_ Wall.E though for a moment before he recalled his saviour. _‘ Shiny Angel!’_ he thought excitedly, before running off to the civilian quarters.

“He seems excited.” Cameron pointed out with a curious brow raised.

 _‘Curious’_ John thought to himself. “So he does.” John replied before changing the subject. “This changes a lot of things you know.” He pointed out. “We have our own T-X, that puts things back into our favour against Skynet’s 900 series.”

“Yes, but the Machine is incomplete, it has no on-board weaponry nor a mimetic sheath.” Cameron replied.

“For now.” John smirked turning his eyes to the data on the screen, information pulled from the T-X’s CPU, information and blueprints of the Machine’s weapons. “We can finish it ourselves.”

* * *

The Generals left the tech labs and walked back into the base’s primary control room. Inside were various members of the Resistance; navigators looking over maps and computer layouts of the Los Angeles area , communications officers manning radios systems communicating to other Resistance bunkers and bases, and a few humans guards.

“Report.” John demanded as he looked upon them.

“Bunker 0093 has reported major Skynet activity in quadrant 8-2 sir.” A female American Communications officer of Asian decent informed him.

Connor walked over to one of his navigation officers and looked at their screen. “Bring up quadrant 8-2.” He ordered, and soon enough the quadrant is brought to his eyes over the computer screen, he smirked. “Skynet’s pissed we took it’s new toy.” He turned his eyes back to the Comms officer. “Did they report what units were in the area?”

“No sir, do you want them to find out?” she asked.

“Yes.” He replied, his mind already working over possible plans, knowing what Units were there would further benefit him to launch a better attack upon the units if need be. He watched the Comms officer give the order through radio and awaited the reply over her headphones, soon enough she turned back to John.

“They’ll send out a small recon team to scout them out.”

“Excellent, I want that information brought to me STAT.” he turned his gaze to others who were still working.

“Anything else?”

“John Henry is wanting to speak to you in your office sir.” A white male Comms officer informed him.

General Connor nodded and left. “I want that information to me as soon as they have it!” he reminded them from over his shoulder, his wife bringing up his rear.

“Things are finally looking better for us Cam, when we have time to study the T-X’s blue prints we can get about to finishing it, then we can plan our attack on Skynet’s factory in the Delta region.” Over the years the Resistance had been pushing Skynet back bit by bit, now the closest heavily Skynet infested area was within the “Delta region” a place that made John uncomfortable due to its close vicinity of one of the Resistance’s bunkers, which luckily hadn’t been detected yet.

Upon entering his office he made his way immediately to his desk with the sound of the door closing behind him, John sat down as Cameron walked over and pulled a chair up beside him then sat down. John activated his private radio altering it to the right frequency before speaking into the microphone.

“This is John Connor, are you there John-Henry?”

Connor glanced to Cameron when there was no immediate answer.

“I am here General Connor.” Came the voice of George Lazlo, the voice of John Henry. “I detected from my units that you successfully captured Skynet’s prototype T-X, correct?”

Connor cleared his throat by swallowing before answering. “That’s right, we got it, got _her_. The endoskeleton is intact, I’ve reprogrammed it’s CPU and replaced Skynet’s code with yours, I’m now letting it roam the base, if, _if_ the TX goes bad, we’ll have the fire power and muscle to take it down.”

“Excellent news Mr Connor …” John Henry replied in an optimistic tone.

“Wait, one second.” Connor interrupted. “The endoskeleton is intact, but the T-X is incomplete, it’s mimetic sheath and weapons weren’t installed upon capture, but we’ve got data from it’s CPU so we could possible build some of the weapons.”

“Interesting.” John Henry replied his voice curious, Connor didn’t doubt the AI’s advanced mind was going into overdrive. “Could I take a look at the information you procured from the chip?”

John looked to Cameron who nodded to him. “Sure, maybe if we both look at it we’ll come up with something.”

“Exactly my thoughts Mr Connor, will you create a copy of the information and have it sent to me?” John Henry asked, the enthusiasm to see the data wasn’t missed in his tone. Connor almost chuckled at the Machine’s child-like glee. Almost.

“Sure, anything else?” he asked.

The was silence, obviously John-Henry was thinking it over.

“Could you send a gift for Savannah, it’s her Birthday soon?” the AI asked.

John smirked. Savannah Weaver, the girl who stayed by her Mother’s side after the bombs fell, the young red head had grown into a beautiful and brilliant woman, Catherine was _very_ proud of her, and seemed to take a large amount of pride in how her daughter had grown.

“How about I send Mr Ellison too?” John offered.

“That would be most appreciated.” John Henry replied, Connor could only imagine the smile on the AI’s face.

“Right I’ll send a Ellison with a copy of the data a squad on protection detail, sound good?”

“Excellent Mr Connor, I look forward to seeing the data.”

Then with that the connection went dead.

“It was good of you to suggest Mr Ellison to deliver the present.” Cameron smiled at her husband.

“Yeah.” John chuckled. “I sometimes wonder who’s happier to see him though, Savvy, John Henry or Catherine.” He smirked at Cameron.

“Savannah likes seeing her ‘father’, John Henry likes seeing his first true friend and Catherine well, perhaps a lot if the rumours are true.” She replied, finishing her statement with a sly tone of voice and a mischievous smirk.

“God help him if they’re true.” John replied warily as he rubbed his temples, but couldn’t help hold back the smirk on his face.

John groaned to himself and stretched his back causing it to release an audible ‘ _pop_ ’. “I’m getting old.” He grumbled.

Cameron smiled sadly at her husband and kissed his cheek. “You may be getting old John, but you’ve still got the body of a 30 year old.” She said comfortingly.

John laughed in reply and looked at her with an amused face. “Oh really? What makes you say that?”

“Well you proved it to me not three hours ago.” She said seductively and ran her tongue over his neck. “You still know how to hit the right places.”

John’s cheeks flared up, the beautiful Machine had that effect on him even after all these years together.

Before anything more could be said or done there was a knock upon the door and a familiar voice.

“Hey John, reports come in from Bunker 0093.” It was Cameron’s voice from the other side of the door.

John chuckled and looked at it. “Come on in Allison.”

The door slid open revealing the young Sergeant Allison Young, she was still the height Cameron had been originally: standing 5 foot 6 and weighing (John guessed) just over 100 pounds, the young girl glanced to John then hesitantly to Cameron, uncomfortable at the slightly aged version of her own face that looked back at her.

“John.” She greeted with a tight smile. “Ma’am.” She said without looking, neither of the Connors were offended, Young had a reason to be cautious around Mrs Connor.

Allison had been kidnapping back in 2026 along with hundreds more humans, all of which had been tortured, examined and forced into slavery at the hands of the Machines, then had a near death experience at the hands of a skinless T-600, only to be saved by the veteran T-850 model 101 “Bob” Terminator. She’d learned upon her return that Cameron had sent Delta Team (a squad of veteran Machines) and a platoon of soldiers to free the prisoners but more specifically to save Allison, over the years Allison had learned the truth about Cameron Connor, many knew she was a Machine, but to know the Machine woman’s exact history had more than scared her a little.

“What’s wrong Allison?” Cameron asked innocently and walked over to her before leaning down to look at her eye to eye.

“You know that, it’s way too early for me … ma’am.” She said hesitantly.

Cameron knew very well Allison couldn’t stand being around her too early in the day, but otherwise were fairly close.

John chuckled watching the two interact, it was like an awkward Mother-Daughter moment.

“So what was it again Corporal Young?” John asked kindly saving the girl any more embarrassment.

“Ugh right, um yeah. The ugh, the report came back from ugh, from the bunker.” She said trying not to look at Cameron’s smirking face which was still close to her’s.

“And what’s the report?” he asked.

“Mark 3 Tank being backed up by a 6 T-800 endos, 4 Triple Eight endos and 3 T-900 endos.” She informed him.

Connor looked up to the ceiling, his eyes glazing over as a plan forms in his mind, then a simple question pops up into his head.

“Direction?” he queried.

“They’re heading South-South East heading towards the quadrant 8-3.” She told him.

Connor looked back up to the ceiling as his mind brought up a plan.   A few more T-900s wouldn’t go a miss, the damn things were hard to come by, the Resistance only had a total of eight as far as he knew. Ambushing and reprogramming the Machines was a sound plan but he’d need to be careful in case his own plan backfired due to this being a Skynet trap.

“I’ll have something planned within the hour, tell them I want an update every twenty minutes.” He informed Young.

“Yes sir.” She saluted, then glanced to Cameron who had yet to move. “Ma’am.” She cleared her throat awkwardly, gaining a smirk from the Cyborg.

“Corporal Young.” Cameron stood up straight and saluted her then both Connors watched as the young woman all but ran out the door, Cameron sighed then turned to John sadly. “She’s losing more weight.”

John closed his eyes and rubbed them with his right index finger and thumb. “I know” He his arm lowered and he looked to Cameron. “damn it I know, the food we’ve been able to pull together from growth, scavenging or what John Henry’s been able to make hasn’t been enough to properly feed everyone.” He turned around and looked at the various pieces of paper pinned to a large wooden board connected to the wall. He walked over to the scraps and examined one in particular his eyes narrowing at what was written on it ‘Project Harvester’. “This project would change everything for the better, it just needs executing properly.”

“It’ll work John.” Cameron said from behind him having walked quietly up to him, she gently placed a hand on his shoulder and kissed his cheek. “I have faith in you.”

John glanced at his wife and gave her a small smile before mouthing: ‘Thank you’.

“You’ll think of something John.”

* * *

_(3 hours later) 22:00_

“… and although they are no longer with us in body, they are with us in in our memories and our thoughts, their spirits now safely in Heaven, where they know no pain nor fear, resting peacefully within God’s embrace. Amen.”

“Amen.” Came the mumbled reply.

Weary aging eyes looked up from ground and gazed across those sat before him, the angry, the vengeful, the mourning, the defeated, the weary, the scarred, the scared and the tired. He’d seen them all, all forms of human emotion, they’d come to him looking for solace, for that brief glimmer of hope and comfort, and he would give what he could in hopes that somehow his words would however brief, take away the pain they felt from his accursed world.

“Thank you Father.” came the dry voice of a woman who stood up and left the room, other thanks came him way before most left leaving only but a few people to mourn their dead be they recent or old.

With a weary sigh he all but collapsed onto the chair behind him, his joints groaning and cracking from age as he stretched, the nearing 60 year old man leaned back against his chair while exhaling deeply, he eyes glancing up to the ceiling where a few lights bulbs dangled after being put up their haphazardly when he’d asked The Generals Connor for lighting.

 _‘I should have had that fixed years ago.’_ He thought once more, after the thousands of times he’d thought it once before, his eyes shifting around the room to take it all in once more.

It was a spare room, with solid concrete walls and flooring, the few light bulbs above him lit the room dimly giving a room that was supposed to be one of hope and faith a feeling of dread and death, very much like the world around them. There were a few pictures of Jesus, the Virgin Mary across the walls, and one of Morgan Freeman as God from ‘Bruce Almighty’. Ellison found it humorous and some people still chuckled at it, those who remembered the movie that is; thus he never took it down. Infront of him was a five six foot crucifix carved out of dead wood, that had been put there by his student; Joseph, after Resistance Command had to flee their old base after Mass Infiltration.

“Father Ellison?” came a monotone but respectful voice from behind the aging man.

Father James Ellison turned around to see a large imposing figure stood before him, dressing in military uniform staring right at him, Ellison didn’t even bat an eye.

“Yes Joseph?” he asked patiently.

Joseph was T - Triple Eight infiltrator, semi-sentient, the Machine Man had programming but was not ruled by it like ‘young’ Machines, nor was he truly free like Cameron Connor, ‘Big Bob’ The HK Reaper, Wall.E or John Henry. The Terminator had been James Ellison’s self-proclaimed protector and student for the past few years and would come to James when he had no immediate orders.   James Ellison understood that gaining sentience was different for all Machines, like children learning to talk and walk, some were able to learn it quickly other were late bloomers, as was Joseph; the Triple Eight had only gained enough true sentience to choose his own name a name he picked from the Bible.

“General Connor has asked if you would partake in a mission concerning our allies.” He stated.

James was curious, his expression showed this. “Which allies?”

“The Machine Resistance.” Joseph replied. “He would you to take vital information to the commanding A.I to our ally along with a present for Miss Weaver.”

Of course, James wondered to himself, Savannah’s birthday was soon, he hadn’t realised it was so close, but never the less, he had a present for the girl, he always had one for his little girl, a soft kind smile spread across the aging man’s face and nodded.

“What’s the information?” he asked as he looked back to Joseph

“Classified” came the immediate answer, James said nothing and waited. Joseph glanced around before leaning closer. “It’s information detailing the blue prints and internal workings of General Connor’s new TX endoskeleton.”

A cold shiver ran down James’ spine at the thought of the TX, that single Machine scared him more than any Machine in history more so than the monster that once used John Henry’s body: Cromartie, and now John had gotten himself one.

“So that’s what happened today.” He murmured to himself, before looking at Joseph. “How will I get there?” he asked

“You will be going by truck, under armed guard, I volunteered my services, we will meet with our allies at an unspecified location, then you will go with them while the others return to base.” Joseph informed him.

Ellison nodded in reply.   “When am I to leave?” he asked.

“Tomorrow morning.” Joseph replied

“I better get some sleep then.” Ellison groaned to himself and rubbed his tired eyes once again before rising. “I’ll see you tomorrow Joseph.”

“I shall walk you to your quarters Father.” The Triple Eight replied bowing his head a little respectfully.

Ellison didn’t argue and allowed his student to walk him back to his room. “Good night everyone.” His said gently to those still mourning in his little church then left followed by Joseph.

As Ellison walked the halls soldiers both made fun of him; for believing in a God that had, as they said ‘abandoned them’ or never existed in the first place and from the state of the world they now lived in, he didn’t blame them, he only prayed that one day it’d be other whether he lived to see it or not, preferably the former though if he had a choice, the other said hello graciously but quietly not wanting to draw attention from the Machine.

The pair stopped outside a smaller room, Ellison turned towards Joseph and nodded his head appreciatively. “Thank you Joseph.”

“You’re welcome Father Ellison.” The Cyborg replied before leaving allowing Ellison to enter his room and close the reinforced door.

With a slight groan the 59 year old man settled down into his arm chair beside his bed a small bedside table beside him with a small lamp and a single bible laid upon it, the book was old, tattered, the pages had turned yellow with age and the small silver cross had broken in half making it look like a small silver ‘L’. Ellison ran his finger carefully over the old book almost afraid it would spontaneously burst into flames if he pressed to hard.

Reaching to the light switch of the lamp he turned it on before switching off the main overhead light from a switch on the wall beside him. He picked up the bible and ever so carefully opened it from where he last finished off where a bookmark protruded from the top of the pages and began to read in silence.

* * *

 

Ellison awoke the next morning to knocking, like the many Resistance soldiers he was awake instantly alerted to all possible threats. “Hello?” he asked.

“James it’s me.” Came the voice of John Connor.

“One second.” James replied while rising from his bed and took the few steps towards the door and unlocked it then pulled it open to reveal the General.

“Good morning James.” John began giving his dear old friend a smile. “I take it ‘Joseph’ informed you of today?” he asked.

“He did. I got my own present to give to Savannah.” He replied.

“Good to hear.” John reached into his pocket and pulled out a single T-888 CPU. “This contains all the information John Henry needs about our new soldier.”

“The T-X.” James commented.

“Yeah, the one we captured was an unfinished prototype. Hopefully between me and John-Henry we’ll be able to finish it.” John replied as he handed the CPU to James. “You’ll be going under arm guard that includes ‘Big Bob’ and ‘Delta Team’ this is a high profile mission, as well as some slight vacation time.” He informed him, the last part added in a joking manner.

Delta Team: A squad of Veteran and self-aware Machines, Connor’s own S.A.S/Navy Seals of the Machines, other than Big Bob back when he was in his ‘old’ T-850 101 body, they were the best, they answered only to either Connor and able to accomplish what would seem impossible.

Ellison knew if Connor were sending _them_ on security and protection detail along with the most experienced Machine, second only to Cameron, in the body of that large HK Reaper, well, he was the safest he’d ever be.

“Understood and I appreciate the protection.” Ellison replied.

“So will the Weavers and John-Henry.” John replied, nearly laughing when he saw a worried expression pass across Ellison’s face. “So the rumours are true?” he asked slyly, Ellison refused to look him in the eye. “You and Catherine. Better you than me James.” John patted the older man’s shoulder.

“When do I leave?” James asked hoping to change the subject.

John check his watch and thought for a brief moment. “Two hours. Get yourself some breakfast, pack light and take a Carbine with you, just in case, meet them at the primary exit point.”

Ellison nodded in agreement before John took his leave.

* * *

 

_**TECH-COM – JOHN HENRY SERIES X PROTOTYPE CPU VERSION: 1.0  
RESISTANCE DESIGNATION: ‘EVE’** _

_**SYSTEMS CHECK …** _

_**MIMETIC SHEATH - N/A** _

_**DAMAGE – 0.2%** _

_**POWER CELL – 100% CAPACITY** _

_**CPU STATUS – READ/WRITE SETTING** _

_**WEAPON SYSTEMS – N/A** _

_**ACCESSING MISSION PARAMETERS:-** _

_**PRIMARY OBJECTIVE:  
PROTECT AND ASSIST GENERALS JOHN  & CAMERON CONNOR** _

_**SECONDARY OBJECTIVE:  
ASSIST RESISTANCE FIGHTERS  & UNITS** _

_**DIRECT ORDER FROM GENERALS CONNOR:  
‘LEARN’** _

_**CURRENT OBJECTIVE:  
MEETING GENERAL J. CONNOR AT HANGAR BAY** _

The slim and slender endoskeleton made her way around the base heading towards the hangar bay, General John Connor had informed her to meet him there at 09:15 hours, the current time being 09:10.

So far she’d been online: 15 hours, 26 minutes and 29 seconds. She’d dealt with the Triple-Eight threat: 13 hours, 27 minutes and 11 seconds ago. After that she turned her attention to the obsolete Cybernetic Organism: the T-400. Though she had no memory of ever being activated by Skynet, she had detailed files on ALL Machines. The T-400 hadn’t been deployed since 2022 when the T-800 series had begun mass production.

So why did the Resistance still have one or rather have several from what she’d encountered? Why had this one attempted to attack a vastly superior Machine when logically evasion would have been the default response? She had watched a young human girl run over and cry on the Machine, it was important to her, but why?

Resistance 800s had appeared not too long after and had carried away the damaged Triple Eight and 400, she had watched the two Generals run past the Triple Eight and look at the 400 with concern then order the Machines to take the 400 to the repair bay. She was curious as to the 400s worth to them as to why it had to be repaired. Curious and intrigued.  She put aside the train of thought as she opened up the door to the Hangar Bay.

Inside was a flurry of activity. A heavily armoured convoy consisting of three vehicles, a single six person jeep reinforced with Coltan-Titanium armor and two armoured trucks, one with a bed and one without but both armoured with mounted heavy fully automatic plasma guns. On the other side a squad of T-800, T-850 and T-888 endoskeletons armed with Plasma Rifles, near them stood a large twelve foot HK Reaper, beside it was General Connor and a dark skinned man, with a Triple-Eight infiltrator stood directly next to him.

All around were human soldiers all shouting to one another as they prepared to open the hangar doors, some stood behind Plasma Turrets others aiming their Projectile or Plasma rifles at the hangar door.

Eve walked over towards General Connor.

“… so you know your mission, you’ve got the information and the packages, have a safe …” Eve heard General Connor say before he noticed her. “AH! James this is our latest addition Eve.”

The dark man ‘James’ turned to look at her, she noted the quicker breaths, focused stare, increase in pulse. He was afraid of her, why? Simply due to being what she was? Suddenly General Connor spoke again as she came to stop by him.

“Eve this is Father James Ellison, the priest of this base.” The General said introducing him to her.

“Hello.” James said shortly.

“Hello.” Eve replied in a mechanical monotone voice before she stuck out her hand as a welcoming gesture.

James took her hand cautiously and shook it. “James will be fine.” he told the cyborg before releasing her hand.

“Eve, I want you to accompany Mr Ellison, Delta Team and the others, I want you to see the world we live in, the world we fight for.” John began, his voice becoming mournful. Ellison, Eve, Joseph and Big Bob would notice the look in his eye, a distant look as his eyes glazed over, he said nothing, didn’t move, Eve turned to glance at Ellison. Suddenly John seemed to return to them with a quick shake of his head. “Sorry. Now Eve if you have any questions don’t hesitate to ask, without asking you can never know, understand?”

Eve nodded her head. “Affirmative.” She replied.

John Connor looked back to James Ellison. “You keep yourself safe James, for all our sakes.” He said before patting the man on the arm.

“I think I got enough protection.” Ellison said in jest as his eyes looked around at all the Machines.

Suddenly human soldier and a single T-800 made their way over the General.

“Sir, area’s quiet, no activity.” The soldier told him, John nodded then looked at the series 800 endo.

“Scan show no activity area clear.” The Machine told him in a mechanical voice.

John nodded before stepping back from them all. “ALRIGHT!” he called to everyone’s attention. “Area is secure! Everyone mount your defensive stations. The hangar doors are about to open!” his voice was firm and strong as people expected of him, Ellison and Connor looked at one another once more before saluting the other with respect.

Ellison, Eve and Joseph made their way to the armoured convoy. “This way Father Ellison.” One of the veteran T-888s informed James before escorting him into the armoured jeep, with Joseph behind him and Eve by his side, the T-888 endo got into behind the wheel, while a T-800 climbed into the passenger side, and an 850 sat beside Joseph in the back.

Other Endoskeletons of Delta Team climbed into the bed-less truck, armoured windows opened as 800s and 888s checked their manoeuvrability as they scanned the horizon with their rifles, armoured backdoors of trucks swung open as a T-850 with a mounted light Plasma Gun swept from side to side, a top panel swung open before a heavier Plasma Gun flipped out, a single Triple-Eight took hold of the weapon and scanned around, turning the gun a full 360 degrees before pulling it back down.

Big Bob the Reaper climbed onto the bed of the other armoured truck, the small quad barrel gun above his head pulled back, his weaponized arms rotated then folded behind his back, he bent down while lowering his torso as his head slid back into the protective covering on his body.

Now the hangar bay doors opened, the sound of the door’s hydraulics groaning broke the tense silence, all around John he saw soldiers awaiting battle ready, fingers almost touching triggers almost begging for some unseen enemy to appear so they could tear it apart.

Two T-600 endoskeletons scanned the immediate area outside before motioning the convoy to move.

“Good luck my friend.” John said quietly to himself as he watched the convoy roll out the hangar bay doors closing behind the bed-less truck. “ALRIGHT! You wall know duties, get to it!” he ordered before turning on his heel and walking back deeper into the base.

* * *

The Convoy had been driving for a two hours now, along the way Joseph had been speaking to James about certain questions he had about God, faith, and the various religions while James, the poor old soul, had been answering them to the best of his abilities but for half an hour everyone had been quiet. However Eve had been thinking once again about the Generals’ reaction to the damaged 400 series, she sometimes glanced to Ellison who continued to gaze on the world outside through the unarmoured section of the window.

 _‘He is close to the Generals. He may have my answers.’_ She thought to herself, General Connor _had_ told her to ask questions to learn, with that in mind she opened her mouth.

“Father Ellison” Eve spoke up to gain the man’s attention.

James turned his head and glanced at Eve from the corner of his eye. “You can just call me James.” He told her, he watched as Eve turned to look at Joseph then back to him. “I’ve been trying to get him to just call me James for years.” He said with slight humour in his voice.

“James.” She said as if testing the word then decided to get back on track. “Before, I destroyed a rogue Infiltrator, a series 400 had been damaged and the Generals’ ordered the older Machine to be sent to the repair labs immediately. Why does the Resistance have obsolete Machines? Why did they care about a series 400 over a more useful Triple-Eight?”

James leaned back into his seat. “The Generals always saw the potential in all Machines, the Triple Eights, 800s, even older models like the 400s. A possibility to be more than they were programmed to be.” He explained.

Eve found herself intrigued. The older series never showed the potential to evolve pass base programming, most were just mindless drones. Could it be something such as a T-400 or older could become self-aware?

“And that particular unit?” she asked.

“He’s special.” James chuckled to himself a genuine smile on his face. “He like the surviving 400s, is self-aware, but there’s just something about _him_ that makes him extra special.”

Eve turned her gaze forward, silently impressed that such an old series of Machines could become Self-Aware. Though incredibly intelligent, she was not self-aware, however her CPU had been set to ‘Read/Write’ mode, she was already learning, she too would become self-aware, sooner than most Machines could.

“How long until we reach our destination?” James asked.

“Another two hours sir.” The 800 in the passenger seat ‘Luke’ told him.

“Heads up, we’ve got Aerial Units incoming 5 o’clock.” came a voice from the radio.

“Acknowledged, Farkas.” Luke replied into the radio.

Suddenly the convoy went into full alert, two latches in the roofs flipped open as Triple-Eights raised up the plasma turrets and opened fire upon the enemy Aerial units.

“Warning we got hostile Units ahead.” Farkas an 850’s voice came from the radio once more.

The Truck up ahead shuddered briefly as it crashed into enemy Machines serving their legs and crushing some under the vehicles weight.

Luke took a hold of their radio and lifted to his face. “Two more Aerial units 2 o’clock, take evasive action.”

Suddenly the jeep swerved and turned as it avoided Aerial fire. “Hang on.” The jeep’s driver ‘Michael’ instructed.

“To what?” Eve asked as the vehicle avoided the HKs fire.

“He means to hold on tight.” James explained as he tried to keep himself from swaying too much. _‘I shouldn’t have eaten gruel.’_ He thought, hoping he wouldn’t throw up in the jeep.

A roar of a rocket was barely heard amongst the plasma fire, suddenly the sound of exploding metal accompanied second later by the sound of metal crashing against metal was heard followed by a loud roar as something crashed into the ground and exploded.

“WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!” Ellison yelled out as he rocked around in his chair.

Luke grabbed the radio. “All units, what was the origin of the sound?”

“Rocket from the Reaper destroyed an engine of an Aerial Unit then crashed into a second, both are destroyed.” Came the voice of Vormund an 888 through the radio.

“This much noise will draw attention to all nearby Skynet units.” Eve spoke up.

“No really?” Ellison asked sarcastically as he held onto his chair.

“Yes.” She replied not detecting the sarcasm.

“We have incoming hostile infantry, and Tanks.” Warned a voice from the radio.

Ellison muttered a curse under his breath and silently prayed to God.

“How did they find us?” he asked a loud.

“The highest probability is that they were in the general area scanning for Resistance forces.” The T-850 ‘Glade’ or ‘Gladiator’ spoke from behind him.

“Fantastic.” James groaned. “Try and get us around the Skynet troops.” He told Michael before turning to the others. “Open the hatches and open fire.” He ordered.

“Hold on!” Michael called out as it put it’s foot down further onto the gas pedal.

The jeep’s armoured ‘windows’ opened and the occupants began firing at Hostile Forces.

Eve turned to Glade behind her. “I require a weapon.” She told it.

Glade looked at her before reaching into the back. “You’ll need more space.” It told her as it passed out a large Infantry Plasma turret with a shortened barrel. “Be careful.”

Eve nodded as she took the weapon, and opened the door while making sure her body shielded James Ellison, she unleashed the full automatic fire from the weapon, super-heated plasma burned through the Skynet infantry that passed. A sudden quick turn made Eve almost fall from the vehicle, a metallic arm wrapped around her left arm while two human arms wrapped around her waist.

“We gotcha!” Ellison said as he and Glade pulled her back into the vehicle safely. Eve passed the weapon back to the 850 once they were in the clear she shut the door and sat back down. Ellison released a long sigh then looked ahead. “I want an update on our situation.”

Luke the 800 grabbed the radio once more. “How’s our situation looking?”

“We’re in the clear, infantry units are out of range, Tank is blind and firing randomly, Aerial is grounded. Over” came the reply

“Excellent work.” Ellison complimented enthusiastically. “What’s our ETA?” he asked

“We are 3.5 miles off course, we must take an indirect route to the meet up point, it could take approximately two to four hours.” Michael replied

“I would suggest you rest Father.” Joseph the T-888 Infiltrator spoke up.

Ellison nodded his head slowly and rubbed his eyes. “I should, but, I can’t it’s not safe yet. I’ll rest when I’m at the Weavers’ base.”

“As you wish.” Joseph replied before leaning back into his chair.

“Luke, check if everyone was injured.” He ordered kindly.

“Yes sir.” The 800 said before picking up the radio once more. “Do we have any injured or offlined?” he asked.

“Negative in up here, we’re fully operational, armor is holding.” Farkas replied.

“We’re fine back here, Big Bob took a few hits but his armor wasn’t penetrated, thanks for asking.” Vormund spoke up after.

Ellison heaved a relieved sigh and leaned back more comfortably in his seat.

Eve turned her gaze back to James. “Do you really care about these Machines?” she asked, Ellison turned his gaze to her curiously. “Or is it because they are your protection?”

Ellison looked to the roof of the jeep in thought. “Not many people see the Machines the way John Connor does. As I said before, he sees the best in them, what they could be, their potential, he doesn’t look at Machines like slaves or mindless drones. He sees a potential individual, a freedom fighter, a true soldier.” He explained before running his tongue over his lips. “I’ll admit, it took me a while, but eventually, I saw it too. These Machines …” he said before gesturing to those in the jeep. “… have saved my life more than once, have saved many lives more than once.” He spoke sincerely. “So in answer to your question. Yes, I do care about these Machines.”

 _‘Interesting.’_ Eve thought to herself. “Thank you for explaining.” She said which caught Ellison off guard at the phrase, though she didn’t take the look of surprise to mind as she turned her gaze out the empty window, her thoughts going back to that old T-400.

* * *

Never before had he been so terrified. Not even with the Triple-Eight was so close to killing him. He had incurred the wrath of a very angry Machine. He hid behind a wall, silently praying it wouldn’t find him. His whole body began to shake in nervousness causing an audible rattle of metal.

Suddenly he felt eyes on him, cautiously and ever so reluctantly he turned around...

Only to gaze into the eyes of a very angry T-500.

“MEEP!” Wall-E cried jumping back in fright.

“Mo.” The T-500 replied angrily before lifting his mop and bringing it down on Wall-E’s head drenching the poor Cyborg’s head in water.

Wall-E shook his head to get rid of the dizziness then stepped back, only to enrage Mo more. During the course of Wall-E’s aimless walking, he’d stepped in a large pile of doggy do-do and had been leaving marks behind on the floor.

Angrily Mo wet his mop once more in cleaning fluid from his bucket before wiping up the mess on the ground, before looking at Wall-E and growing angrily.

Wall-E looked at where the mess had been then at Mo, then back to the floor, then rubbed a foot over it again making another mark.

Mo cried in anger before wiping up the mark again and stared at Wall-E angrily. Only one expressionless Machine could tell expression from another expressionless Machine.

Wall-E lifted his foot as high as he could and wiped it on his hand, Mo watched him angrily, only to have Wall-E rub it onto Mo’s face.

Mo froze on spot. Everything froze, time seemed to stand still.

“AAAHHHHH!!!” Mo cried out before wiping his own face with the mop allowing Wall-E time to escape. Once cleaned the enraged 500 gave chase to the 400 while mopping the floor as fast as his hydraulics would allow, his little bucket on wheels being dragged along behind him by the piece of rope connecting them. The entirety of the tunnels echoed with the sound of heavy metal pounding against concrete ground as two older machines moved faster than their series should allow.

In a small room carved into the side of one of the tunnels, six women illuminated by a small fire were huddled around a small wooden table playing a game of cards all in different states of undress, of these six women, two were Triple Eights, two were T-895s one being shorter and skinnier than the other, and the final two were human soldiers.

“Damn it.” Cursed one of the Triple Eights while throwing down her losing hand onto the floor before removing her shirt leaving her in only her bra and pants. The others laughed.

Suddenly they looked up from their card game upon hearing the echoing pounding getting louder and louder, before any could move the watched as Wall-E ran past them followed shortly by Mo, only moments later for Mo to stick his head back around the corner and stare at the women before him noticing the Machine women had minor damage to their skin, regardless he released a wolf-whistle in appreciation before running after Wall-E once more.

The ladies looked to one another then shrugged.

“Who’s up for another game?” one of the humans asked as she shuffled the pack of cards.

Throughout the chase which went all around the base, people and Machines alike dodged out of the way of the frantic 400 and enraged 500.

“HEY WATCH IT!” some humans would yell.

“CRAZY METAL!” other’s would yell.

“OW MY FOOT!” was heard a few times.

Older T-1s reversed out of their way, T-70s stomped aside, other Machines from other 400s up to 888s pressed themselves against the wall, an allied T-1001 turned into an arch way for the Machines to pass under before shifting back and watching the little bucket squeak along behind them, a look a pure confusion upon his face.

John Connor heard the commotion and stepped out from his office and watched the 400 hurtling towards him, with authority he stepped into their path raised his hand and yelled.

“STOP!”

Wall-E stopped dead immediately infront of him, too soon for Mo as the 500 crashed into the 400 sending them both collapsing onto the floor just inches from John.

Again everything froze, people and Machines watched the abrupt end to the chase.

“AAAIIEEEE!!!” “AAAHHHHH!” came the frantic cries to Wall-E and Mo respectively as their limbs flailed Wall-E unable to get up from Mo’s weight, Mo frantic from falling over on top of Wall-E, General Connor laughing loudly at the display, Cameron by his side chuckling as well.

“Kids these days.” Cameron quipped with a smile upon her face.

John brought his chuckling under control and looked at the two Machines who had now, gotten to their feet.

“What’s going on you two?” he asked, the laughter still in his voice.

“Feet!” Mo pointed down to Wall-E’s feet.

John and Cameron both glanced down to Wall-E’s feet which were dirty, and now they noticed the sight, they noticed the smell.

“Oh god!” John groaned as he held his nose. “Wall-E, let Mo clean your feet.” He ordered.

The 400 grumbled and kicked the floor like a child thus allowing Mo to wash him. Once finished the T-500 stood up straight and saluted the Generals before him.

“Good work Mo.” John said with a smile before turning to Wall-E and chuckled. “And you watch where you’re stepping.” Connor watched as the 400 saluted half-heartedly while sulking. “Alright you two, dismissed, you can get back to work tomorrow.” With that said John Connor turned and walked further into the base followed by Cameron.

Wall-E and Mo glanced to one another.

“WOOO!” they cried in joy before running off looking for something else to do.

* * *

As Cameron and John walked towards the Operations Room they heard a low growling rumble.

“Uughh.” John groaned and held his stomach.

“John, you haven’t eaten in days, you need nourishment.” Cameron said in a caring yet worried tone.

It was true John hadn’t eaten, it wasn’t just because food was still a rare commodity, it was simply a matter of two things; with all the work to be done keeping the Resistance organised and planning missions he would simply forget to eat and he would always put his soldiers before himself, food was scare and they were out in the battlefield more than him these days, he wouldn’t allow them to starve and he would eat after everyone had their turn.

“I’m fine Cameron I …”

“No John!” she interrupted angrily, angry at his stubbornness. “You are becoming malnourished you need to eat.” Cameron took a firm grip around his wrist and pulled him towards the base’s mess hall.

“B-but the reports! The plans” he whined like a little kid, ignoring the amused and confused stares from passing soldiers.

“No buts! You’re eating and that’s FINAL!” she ordered as she all but kicked the mess hall door open and pulled him along.

“Cameron please, everyone can see.” He whined

Cameron rolled her eyes. _‘Sometimes it’s like he never grew up.’_ Sometimes, _that_ was a good thing, sex for instance, but now it was annoying.

“It doesn’t matter, it’s still my primary objective to keep you safe, you can’t be safe if your starving.” She said as she grabbed some soldiers from the long queue and pulled them out of her way. “Get a tray John!” she demanded.

John admitted defeat and got a tray while getting served.

“You can see who wears the pants in _that_ relationship.” Whispered a familiar voice.

Cameron turned her head and glared at the owner of the voice: Lieutenant Derek Reese.

This was a different Derek that a different John had sent back into the past.

“Do you find something _funny_ lieutenant?” she growled in annoyance.

Derek went pale, he’d temporarily forgotten that Cameron Connor had highly sensitive hearing due to her Machine nature.

“No ma’am.” He gulped.

“Good.” She turned her attention back to John who was getting some gruel, some rice, an apple and a tin cup of water.

“This’ll do.” He said and looked to Cameron, who was staring at his tray in a judgemental manner.

“Yes, it’ll do.” She conceded and walked towards one of the ‘executive’ tables.

These tables unlike the rest were always guarded by T-800s or 850s. These tables were where the highest of ranking officers could sit, or close friends of the Generals, and sometimes John would give secret or highly important missions to those who would gather around him. Cameron had asked why he didn’t give out these missions in private, using his own John Connor logic he argued.

“Who’d expect me to give out important missions while stuffing my face?”

His logic was flawed, but it worked, somehow.

“Good day General.” The 800 guards said as a welcome.

“Hey boys.” He replied as he sat down at a table, Cameron stood to his side.

“Now I’m leaving you here, I will deal with the reports, and I don’t want you to move until you’ve finished, understood?” she ordered glaring at her husband.

“yes dear.” He said timidly, she could truly be frightening at times.

Cameron marched off before turning to the 800s. “He doesn’t leave until his tray in empty, understood!” she ordered.

“Understood.” The 800s replied, John could almost imagine a sweat drop running down the backs of their heads. Cameron turned and marched off not noticing the two 800s glance to one another then glance at John who was already eating then looked straight ahead once more.

* * *

There had been no more hostile forces since the armoured Convoy was attacked just over two hours ago, during this time Eve had continued to ask questions to Ellison. Why did humans fight? What had the world been like before the bombs? Where had John Connor met Cameron? Was it true Cameron was a Machine? Why did James believe in God? Was John Connor secretly Jesus? And so many more.

James had a rather happy to answer them, he was amazed by the questions the TX had asked, amazed at her curiousness, and he had answered to the best of his abilities.

Eve took in all the answers he had given her and analysed them deeply within her CPU, her whole mind whirring with information, and how somethings, made her _feel._ She found herself actually sad when James had described how beautiful the world had been compared to husk it was now, she wished to see how the old world had been.

“Sir we’ve got contacts ahead.” Came Farkas the 850’s voice from the radio.

“Hostile?” Ellison asked out loud.

“Are they hostile?” Luke asked into the radio

“Unknown.” Came the reply leaving everyone tense. “Wait. I see. General Weaver.”

Everyone relaxed and Ellison sighed in relief.

“They must have sent a scouting party for us.” Michael commented.

“Thank you God.” James whispered to himself.

“Amen.” Joseph added on quietly.

The armoured convoy pulled up beside the Machine Resistance troops.

“James!” came an ever so familiar Scottish voice.

James got out of the jeep carefully and groaned as he stretched. “Catherine!” he called out and walked towards them.

Delta Team, Joseph, Eve and Big Bob followed behind him scanning the area for threats.

“Catherine, I believe John Henry wanted _this._ ” he said as he pulled out the Triple-Eight CPU containing the information on Eve.

Catherine stepped up to James and took the chip from him. “Thank you, he’ll be happy to see it, but he’ll be happier to see you.” She said with a small smile, before stepping closer to and spoke in a sly tone of voice. “But not as happy as me, lover.”

She then pressed her lips to his.

* * *

The Skynet tank rolled slowly across the desolate LA landscape. Surrounding it were Endoskeletons of various models armed with Plasma Rifles as their eyes scanned their surroundings.

“General, we got ‘em in our sights, targets confirmed twelve targets, six 800s, four Trip – Eights and three 900s, and a single Mark 3 Tank, orders?”

The Skynet Machines had no idea that they were in the sights of Resistance troops. The Squad leader spoke quietly into the portable radio slung over the back of one of his men.

“We want them all captured if possible, the 900s are your primary capture targets, the rest … well they’re a bonus.” Came the voice of Cameron Connor. “You’re men should have been equipped with Electrical Dart Guns yes?”

The soldier turned back as his men hoisted up large cylindrical weapons nicknamed ‘The Stunner’ by the Resistance, inside were magnetic darts that would unleash a high torrent of electricity, these had been greatly beneficial in the capturing enemy units as they would reboot until the darts had been removed.

“We got them ma’am.” The Squad leader replied.

“Is your secondary team in position?” she asked.

The Squad leader turned towards a soldier with night vision binoculars. “Are they ready?” he asked.

The soldier looked then moved his arms in sign. “They’re ready sir.”

“They’re ready ma’am.” He informed her.

“You have your orders.” She said with finality.

The Squad leader turned to his men and gave them a simple nod. “I want stunners upfront, everyone else give them support.”

The Resistance soldiers move along the war torn debris, then ducked behind a set of vehicles. The Squad Leader tapped his scout and raised three fingers, the scout nodded silently and rose up using his binoculars to signal to the other squad, he seemed to get a reply as he knelt back down.

“They’re ready sir.”

“On the count of three, I want stunners to unload on the Tank and the 900s.” he ordered them, he looked to his scout. “Okay ready? … Three.”

The Scout held up his right hand three fingers up.

“Two …”

Two fingers.

“One.”

The middle finger.

“let’s do this …” he whispered to himself. “FIRE!” he cried

The Stunners moved out from their cover and fired a barrage of magnetic darts at the Tank and the 900s. Multiple darts slammed into the body of the tank, the Machine going berserk as the electrical current rushed around it’s body, causing it’s Plasma Cannons to fire at random objects.

The 900s shook slightly before opening fire on their enemies followed quickly by the 800s and Triple Eights.

Soldier ducked for cover as plasma flew their way, others moved leaned out and fired back.

“Keep ‘em pinned.” The Squad Leader yelled as he rose up and fired his Stunner at a single 900 it’s body went through a spasm and twitched, slowly it recovered but it’s movement were much more jerky and slow.

The other Endos saw what was happening and reached out to remove the darts only for light Plasma and Armor piercing rounds to strike them in their back and arms.

“POUR IT ON ‘EM!” the Squad Leader yelled as more darts rained down upon the Skynet units.

The Tank’s cannons had stopped firing and now the whole Machine was simply spinning around in circles while it’s cannons spun around. The 900s were fairing no better, one had already fallen to it’s knees before it’s systems overloaded and forced into a permanent shut down, the other two followed suit not too long after.

There was no cover for them, the ambush had gone according to John’s plan. All Skynet units had shut down.

“YES! Fantastic fucking work gentlemen.” The Squad leader cheered to his men on a successful mission. He walked up to the soldier with the radio back-pack and spoke into the microphone. “Command this is Squad Leader Jenkins, requesting transport for the Skynet troops, we got ‘em tank and all.”

“Fantastic work Leeroy!” John Connor’s voice came through the radio. “We’re sending evac now, hold your positions and hang tight.”

* * *

 

It had taken two hours to get vehicles out there to move the heavy Tank and endos then get them back to base where they were taken under Resistance Machine guard to the tech labs to have their CPUs removed, while the tank had it’s chip removed inside the Hangar.

Cameron accompanied John to the tech labs to look over the new 900s personally, his eyes travelled over the armoured endoskeletons., he’d radioed ahead to tell the techies to leave the 900s for himself.

“Three more 900s Cam, three more. They’ll make a hell of a difference.” He said quietly as he ran his hand over an armoured chest plate.

“I know. We’re fortunate that your plan worked as it should.” Cameron said softly behind him while placing a hand on his shoulder.

“Yeah, yeah.” He said as his mind focused on another topic. “Have we had any contact from Delta team?” he asked as he turned to look at his wife.

“Nothing yet John.” She said reluctantly.

John looked back to the three 900s. “I would like to get a few of these out in the field rather than stay here as guards.” John sat down on the nearby chair and leaned forward while drumming his fingers together just below his eye level. “Three more 900s, than means eleven in total at this base.” He said while deep in thought.

“You’re going to remove vital information from their CPUs, then transfer a more experienced Machine from one CPU into these?” she asked though already knew the answer, the process had been done multiple times in the past.

“Yeah. Specifically Delta team, if we can transfer a few of them into 900s that’ll give them a needed power boost.” John confirmed.

John got to work hooking up the first CPU to the computer interface. His skills with CPU hacking, reprogramming and file searching had dramatically increased since the beginning of the war, his attempt at hacking the CPU of Vick Chamberlin was only a far off memory.

“Hmm, interesting.” He thought out loud. Before leaning back into his chair.

“What do you have John?” Cameron asked as she looked at the computer screen.

“Skynet seems desperate to find this base, this unit has detailed files of kidnapping and _interrogation …”_ he said putting sarcasm into his final word.

“More like torture.” Cameron said as the screen showed a Resistance soldier being beaten through the eyes of the Machine, demanding time and time again for the location of John Connor, in time the soldier died his final words of ‘Fuck You’ before his body gave in.

“That was Corporal Dunn.” Cameron said quietly.

“Yeah it was.” John said sombrely. “He squad was MIA a week ago. Now we know what happened to them, him at least.”

John closed his eyes and mentally calmed himself telling himself over and over again that the Machine’s action were down to Skynet programming, he would save it, save them all from their abusive master.

“Shall I inform his wife personally?” she asked and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder

“No, no I’ll do it.” John sighed before rubbing his temples before he brooded for a moment. “Bastards probably left nothing of him but ash.” He groaned from mental exhaustion before looking over the three 900s once more. “Their deaths won’t be in vain.” He murmured to himself.

“No one’s death is ever in vain John, remember that.” Cameron said softly before she knelt down and kissed his cheek.

“I know, I know, you’re right, but sometimes I wonder.” He leaned forward in his chair staring at the shining chrome skull before him. “Will all the deaths be really worth it in the end? The survivors will have little food, little water, majority of people don’t even know how to grow plants … not that the soil can sustain life.” His eyes never left the cold blank face of the Machine. “Even if we win the war, could humanity really survive another hundred or so years?”

“You already know the answer John, humanity _will_ survive, but you’re already taking steps to make it better, correct?” she inquired though already knew the answer. “Project Harvester is already in it’s first year of planning development John, I know when it’s ready to go, the plan will be ‘air tight’ nothing would be able to go wrong, because YOU thought of it, YOU planned it and it will change the Resistance for the better, because of you.” Cameron was staring into his eyes intently before kissing him gently on the lips.

‘Thank You’ he mouthed to her once the kiss was broken.

John and Cameron got back to work, moving all the vital information from the 900s chips into the computer; this would be beneficial later. They were half way through the final CPU when there was a knocked on the door, immediately Cameron put herself between it and John not noticing the small but pleasant smirk on her husband’s face.

“Identify.” She ordered fiercely

A unforgettable Austrian voice spoke up from the other side. “Series 850 model 101 combat infiltrator serial number 6. 2. 9. 5…”

“’Bob’ would have done nicely.” John spoke up.

“It is Bob.” Bob spoke up once more.

Cameron turned to John who nodded to her.

“Enter.” She said in a calmer tone of voice.

The door opened and in stepped the 1 year old Infiltrator using the body that until a year ago had been Big Bob’s.

“What do you need?” John ask while poking his head around Cameron, who had yet to move.

“Scouts have reported seeing Delta team returning to base ETA 49 minutes.” Bob replied.

A look of relief and satisfaction swept across John’s face. “Excellent.” Then confusion crossed his brow. “49 minutes?” he asked.

“Affirmative, I received the information eleven minutes ago, and was told an hour.” The infiltrator replied.

John chuckled a little. “I’ll still give them roughly an hour, Machines are a lot more accurate than humans.” He stood up and moved around Cameron who by now had slightly relaxed her stance.

“I want you to intercept Delta team at the hangar bay and have them report to me at my control room for mission debriefing.”

“No problemo.” The T-101 smirked briefly before his stoic expression returned. “Also reports claim there has been a cease in Skynet activity in the general area, some of it’s units seem to be retreating into more heavily infested Skynet territory.”

John glanced to Cameron; the two sharing a look of intrigue.

“Thank you Bob. If there’s nothing else, you are dismissed.” John instructed as he turned back to look at Bob.

Wordlessly the 850 saluted, turned and walked out.

“What do you think Skynet’s planning?” Cameron asked as she turned to look at John.

“I was hoping you’d have an idea, perhaps it’s regrouping or maybe even afraid we have it’s TX unit operational.” John suggested but truly had no idea.

“If it knew it was operational then a Skynet force may have intercepted Delta Team.” Cameron pointed out. “Hopefully none of them were damaged.”

“Here’s hoping.” He said quietly to himself. Wordlessly he sat back down at the computer and continued to work on the 900 CPU.

* * *

 

_(1 hour, 15 minutes later)_

The Hangar Bay doors closed once more that day as Delta Team finally returned, the endoskeletons, Eve and Big Bob disembarked the convoy.

Bob stepped up to the returning squad and stood infront of their leader Michael.

“General Connor wants you and your team to debrief him in the General’s control room.” The Infiltrator informed him.

“Understand.” Michael replied before nodding to his squad.

“I will join you.” Eve spoke up

Michael thought about arguing, a normal 888 would have, but then again, Eve was an X series, there was NO WAY he was arguing. “As you wish.”

Delta Team deposited their Plasma weapons to the base’s armorer before making their way, with Eve, to the control room. Michael paused outside the room and knocked.

“Identify!” came the stern voice of Cameron Connor.

“Delta Team squad leader Michael, Delta team reporting in.” Michael informed them.

“As am I.” Eve spoke up not noticing the glance the Triple-Eight endoskeleton gave her.

“Alright come on in.” John called out.

Michael opened the door about to go in only to meet the strong metal hand of Eve and she walked on in infront of him, behind her Michael shook his head before walking in himself.

Connor’s control room was large and circular, a single computer in the middle on a large circular metal table with a large screen at its centre with smaller screen surrounding around it. The Machines found General Connor stood in the middle of the room, hands behind his back awaiting them, Cameron stood right beside him as ever.

“Delta Team, Eve.” He greeted with a nod.

“General.” Michael greeted in return the others giving their own greeting. Eve waved.

With greetings out of the way Michael began debriefing the two Generals upon what happened once they left, the simple two hour drive, the attack from Skynet forces and the HKs then their victory over the Skynet units, meeting up with the Machine Resistance handing over Ellison and his Triple-Eight student before returning to base.

John by now was sat on a single foldable chair, leaning back with his eyes closed. Delta Team had seen the expression before, his was picturing the whole thing in his mind, sometimes they somewhat scared at how accurate his mind would picture the events.

He opened his eyes then wordlessly stood. “Excellent work, all of you, I knew I was right in sending you on protection detail.” He smiled to himself before stepping forward. “I’ve got a treat for you all.” He said with an air of mystery.

No one else could understand how either Connor could do it, but they could see each Endoskeleton as an individual, their different mannerisms, and gestures, he even see ‘emotion’ being portrayed by with their expressionless faces. Right now Eve looked intrigued and Michael looked confused yet curious, a simple expression befalling the others in Delta Team.

“Before you left, I was informed of a Skynet force moving towards a sector I didn’t want them near so sent retaliation to disable them, of that force there were three series 900s, bringing our total to 11.” He paused for dramatic purposes. “Unlike the rest, I want these 900s in the field, not here guarding the base.”

“And you want them to join our team?” Michael asked, if he had skin he’d have raised a brow curiously.

“Close.” John smirked. “I want to update some of you into 900 bodies, from there, we’ll be updating you four into newer bodies.” He said while looking at the four T-800s before turning his focus back to Michael. “It’ll be up to you to decide who gets the new 900 bodies and CPUs. You have an hour to decide, meet me in the tech labs.”

“Yes sir General Connor.” Michael and the others saluted, Eve included.

“Is there anything anyone wants to ask or to add?” John offered looking at each individual Machine. “No? Very well then, dismissed.” He turned his eyes to the TX “Eve you’re on guard duty, get yourself more familiarized with the base.”

“Yes sir.” Eve replied.

Once Delta Team and Eve had left John collapsed into the chair behind him, some stress and tension left his muscles and relief was seen upon his face.

“That’s a load off my mind.” He said tiredly and rubbed her eyes with his left thumb and index finger. “I won’t have to worry about James for a while.”

Cameron smirked as she leaned against the wall. “You’re right, Catherine won’t want to let go of him for a while, it could be a week until we see him again.” She joked causing John to chuckle.

“If we’re lucky.” John added going along with the joke. “I’m just glad he’s safe … well safer.” He quickly corrected himself.

“I hope John Henry analyses the data quickly.” John speaks up once more. “Then we can get a fully armed TX on our side.”

“I’m sure he’ll be excited to analyse it John, he’s always been efficient at what he does.” She reminded him. “It’s also thanks to him that the percentages of Triple Eights ‘going bad’ has dropped 26.82 percent.”

John nodded, that was something that John Henry had been good at, creating a more sophisticated reprogramming software, mostly for the troublesome Triple-Eights whose advanced CPU would revert back to their Skynet programming, Cameron had pointed out a possibility of the 890 & 900 series possibly going bad as well, as they were more intelligent Machines, but so far, nothing had happened. Yet. That was the main reason John had at least one T-850 or a veteran Machine anywhere near a 900 or a simply reprogrammed 890, reprogrammed 850s were more reliable programming and a Veteran Machine were their own identity, they wouldn’t do bad unless they chose too.

“Yeah, you’re right, I’m just nervous is all.” He admitted while rubbing his hands. “Just nervous.” He repeated quietly.

Cameron knew she was the only one to see John at his weakest, the only one allowed to see it, other than possibly James Ellison, no other person be they organic or cybernetic was allowed to see him like it, emotional and weak. He could show no doubt infront of the men and women who served under him, he could not show weakness. He _would_ not show weakness.

Cameron walked over to John and knelt beside him. “You have nothing to be nervous about John, everything will go according to plan, don’t worry.” She said comfortingly. John looked at her and smiled appreciatively. “We better go, if we both do our part then it won’t take as long.” She kissed him gently before standing and aiding him to stand as well.

“Okay. Let’s go.”

* * *

 

Elsewhere within the base Wall-E was finishing helping Suzie and her friends with capturing rats for dinner, the old Terminator would put his foot down upon their little skulls killing them instantly or simply step on their tails. Not many Machines did jobs such as this, mostly the remaining 400s and 500s, all except Mo: the germ freak.

Suzie and her friends thanked Wall-E for his help before helping them set up a small fire, and skewered the rats on a spit made of metal set it upon a frame and allowed the kids to slowly turn the cooking rats.

“Thanks Wall-E.” Suzie beamed to her cybernetic friend.

“Yes.” He replied before “Go.” He said while pointing elsewhere.

“Okay Wall-E thanks again.” She waved goodbye to him as the Machine walked off noisily.

His aimless walking had brought him to the object of his recent fascination.

 _‘THE SHINY!!’_ He thought excitedly.

The scene was almost magical, there it was, the small slender Endoskeleton stood staring at the fire burning through the alloy trash can, the light of the flames reflected upon her body. She hadn’t seemed to notice him yet, maybe he was a lot more stealthy than he though, which was nigh impossible, or maybe the Shiny was deaf. Either way, this was his chance to actually meet it.

As casually as he’d seen humans do he stood in a similar stance to hers and crab walked closer and closer towards her, her focus never leaving the light of the fire. Now he stood no more than three feet from her, and she had yet to acknowledge him.

Copying another human mannerism Wall-E had seen he rose his clenched fist up to his head, roughly where his mouth would be, if he had one, and simulated his best cough.

“Objective.” The Machine asked so suddenly Wall-E recoiled from her in surprise. In truth Eve had heard him coming for a long time and had been using that time to sort through her thoughts and analyses of this unit, her immediate thought was to find out more about him, firstly his mission objectives.

Wall-E stared at her for a moment frozen in his recoiled position. “Huh?” he asked.

“Objective?” Eve asked once more.

Wall-E stood up carefully then looked around to show her, noticing some scattered wooden boxes he made his way over to them and quickly stacked them neatly.

“Ta-da!” he said with pride he arms out infront of him showing his work.

“Ooh!” Eve replied with intrigue.

Before either could say another word the boxes were scattered with a single kick as a Triple-Eight endoskeleton guard made it’s way past them. Somewhat stunned Wall-E could only follow the Triple-Eight by turning his body his arms still in their ‘presenting’ form.

“Oh.” Wall-E finally said disheartened as his arms fell to his side with his head lowered sadly.

Eve found the 400s reaction curious, and something else … funny?

Putting it aside for now Wall-E looked back up to the shiny who was still looking at him curiously. “Ob … ject …ive?” he said slowly trying to copy the word.

“Objective?” she asked pointing to herself, Wall-E nodded. “Ensure the survival of John and Cameron Connor and assist the Resistance where possible.” She rattled off quickly.

Wall-E stared at her blankly then ever so slightly tilted his head.

His lack of response actually made Eve feel something, awkward was it? _‘Analyse anomaly at a later date.’_ She mentally instructed herself.

“Designation?” she asked, Wall-E said nothing. “Serial Number?” again nothing. “Name?”

“Oh!” Wall-E stood up straight now he understood. “W … Wa … Wall-E.”

“Wall-E.” Eve said in an unintentionally seductive tone.

“Ooooohhh.” Wall-E suddenly felt his internal systems heat up rapidly, he could swear his steel alloy was turning red.

“Wall-E.” Eve said once more in a friendly tone then found herself giggling her shoulders shaking up and down. “Eve.” She said telling him her name.

“Eeeeeee.” He said trying the word.

“EeeeVE.” She said punctuating the ‘ve’

“EEEEEEE-aaaaaa!” Wall-E said once more trying it again

“Eeeeeve! Eeeeeve!” she was almost singing her name and found herself rising to the balls of her feet with every word.

“EEEEEevvvaaa!” he said before stepping closer to her making the smaller advanced Machine giggling once more. “Eeevvvaaa!” and found himself bouncing on his knees slightly.

Eve continued to giggle then looked at him straight in the face. “Eve.” She didn’t know why, she’d never be able to explain it, but she liked Wall-E, he was an anomaly among their kind.

Wall-E and Eve spent only a few more minutes gazing into the fire with interest, Wall-E would ask simple questions and Eve would reply as simply as she could, for whatever reason Wall-E seemed to have trouble speaking long words, but this was of no problem to her. She would ask questions he would either reply simply or if possible, show her.

It was then Wall-E had an idea. A great idea!

“Follow.” Before waving for her to follow him, without questioning she followed him.

Wall-E lead Eve through the base, down the deepest civilian tunnels and what lay before was something she didn’t expect, before her was a hole in the wall, 6 feet wide by 9 feet tall covered with barely fitted together material that was nailed into the concrete.

“Here.” Wall-E told her softly before pulling back the material and indicated Eve to walk in, she did so and immediate her mouth opened in shock and wonder.

A large room, possibly once used for storage was filled with objects, trinkets and knick knacks from the floor all the way to the ceiling, there were shelves that had been haphazardly connected to rotary system for easy access for others a large steel ladder was nearby.

“Wow.” Were the only word Eve could use to describe what she saw.

“Eva likes?” he asked hesitantly.

“Yes.” She replied in awe.

The two cyborgs walked further into the room together, Wall-E always watching the wonder in Eve’s eyes and her slack jawed expression, Eve was taking in the sight before her still, wondering how long it had taken to accumulate, how long it had been here.

Wall-E showed her around the room, showing her trinkets, damaged toys, old accessories, bubble wrap and a number of other things.

“How?” she asked looking at the old 400.

“Find, outside.” He said simply.

Eve looked once more around the room, it must have taken years to gather all the items, possibly a long time to set up the rotary system.

“You make?” she asked pointing to the rotary system itself. Wall-E nodded. “Ooooh.” She said in wonder, she turned to Wall-E who gestured her to stay there before he turned and walked elsewhere in the room.

Eve glanced around at the various items, curiously she picked up a rotary whisk, analysing the object she grabbed the handle and turned it making the end of it rotate.

“Ooh!” she said in amusement before making it spin faster and faster, eventually causing the end to fly off it’s frame and become encase in the ceiling, panicking Eve replaced the tool and placed her hands behind her back, trying her best to look nonchalant just as Wall-E returned with a cube in his hand.

“Eva!” he said placing the cube in her hand then manoeuvred the top to twist.

Intrigued Eve looked the item over, from top to bottom and all it’s sides.

Happy with Eve being amused Wall-E turned and picked up a damaged lava lamp, he didn’t know it was a lava lamp, he just knew it was red and looked funny. Returning to Eve he found the rubix cube has been completed, every colour in the right place, shocked he picked it up from her hand before placing the lava lamp into her grasp, Wall-E looked over the cube fascinated and amazed before placing it on a shelf, before looking back to Eve.

“Ooh.” Eve said in awe as she gazed upon the illuminated lamp.

If Wall-E had eyebrows they’d have shot off the top of his head and hit the ceiling. He looked to where Eve had positioned her hands and found her taking hold of the severed plug cable.

When Eve had taken hold of the cable, she found she was able to manipulate the electrical current in her hand that would normally be used to reconfigure her lower arm into a variety of weapons and feed it into the cables thus illuminating the lava lamp.

“Woah.” Wall-E remarked at last.

* * *

 

Back within the base, John and Cameron Connor sat within a large room within the ‘ _technology advancement_ ’ section of the base: the largest Tech Lab. Before them were a few members of Delta Team. Infront of John were two metallic tables, Michael the T-888 lay upon one, an empty T-900 on the other, beside him was a computer with two CPU interfaces, the 900 series CPU was already inserted. Infront of Cameron were another two tables, another 900 on one, and another T-888 ‘Dimitri’ lay on the other, as with John a computer was by her side a 900 CPU inserted into one of the chip interfaces.

“Alright you two ready for this?” John asked

“We’re ready sir.” Michael replied.

“Ready General.” Came the Russian accent of Dimitri.

John turned to Cameron and nodded. Both began the process of removing the CPUs from the skulls of the Machines’, all life fading from them immediately.

“I hate this part.” John said sadly. He hated having bare CPUs out in the open where they were vulnerable, in his hand was the very core existence of one of his most valuable soldiers, a living being.

“It’s alright John, nothing will happen.” Cameron said calmingly.

Without a word both inserted the 888 CPUs into the other chip interfaces and began to work on the computer.

“Alright, full CPU transfer is initiated.” John said aloud, on the screen it showed that all the information within the 888 series chips were being uploaded into the 900s, it was a process that had been used before.

“Each time it gets longer and longer.” John mumbled to himself, with rise in personalities, experiences and memories the transfer took longer and longer each time it took place.

“What time you got Cam?” he asked.

“Transfer completion will take five hours and 49 minutes.” Cameron replied.

“Jesus.” He groaned. “It only took four and a half hours last time.” He looked to the other member of Delta Team. “We’ll be pulling an all-nighter gentlemen, you wanna stay here and wait or do you wanna patrol?” John offered.

A T-850 ‘Viktor’ stepped forward, Viktor was considered Dimitri’s direct brother, having come off the assembly line and been sent out into the field by Skynet at the exact same time back when they were 600s. Now, Viktor was the larger of the two brothers and as such the tallest of Delta Team standing at a large 6 foot 4, his frame was slightly larger than a typical 850.

“No General, this was already discussed beforehand, those here will wait, the others will go on patrol if need be.” The Russian Machine spoke up.

A strange fact about the brothers was that, neither actually came from Russia, they were built in L.A. why they gave themselves Russian accents was unknown to everyone except the brothers themselves.

John smiled at Viktor’s words, Delta Team were a close knit unit, they stayed together, they stayed close, if one Machine fell, they ran back to either pull him away whole or remove his CPU so he could one day be reborn. John found it a very admirable trait in these Machines.

“Very well. In the mean time I have work, let me know when the transfer is complete.” He rose from the computer and walked to a desk in the corner so John could work, an addition added later as transfers had become longer.

John read over reports sent by other leaders around the LA area, Major Branson reporting an increase in Skynet aerial sweeps, while a Colonel Lorenzo reported Mark 2 & 3 Tanks patrolling the area accompanied by hostile Reapers and endoskeletons.

John narrowed his eyes as he imagined the scenes before him, Skynet seemed to be getting desperate to find them, the encounter Delta Team had earlier only further proved his suspicions. Was it truly that Skynet was scared that they now had it’s only TX? Or was it more? Was there something he hadn’t seen just yet, something hidden? John mentally cursed as he thought of a way to put his fears to rest, or something to allow him to know the full scale of what Skynet was planning.

John glanced behind him and watched the few Machines of Delta Team.

‘ _This could be a perfect opportunity to test the 900 series capabilities out in the field._ ’ John thought to himself, _‘Well after all of the transfers are complete.’_ He added.

“What is on your mind John?” Cameron asked from beside him.

John looked to her and showed her the reports. “Either Skynet is really scared we got Eve or it’s using these as cover for something big. When the transfers are complete I want to send Delta Team out on recon.” John explained to her.

“You’re logic is sound, good idea.” She replied and gently rubbed his back, she kept her gaze on the reports as she thought. “Perhaps it would also be beneficial to send Eve as well.” She suggested.

John looked at her curiously. “How so?”

“Well, it would be effective for her to gain experience in battle, while I wouldn’t suggest for her to go alone in case of capture especially in her incomplete state, she would be safer going with Delta Team.” She explained.

John nodded wordlessly, he couldn’t argue with the idea. “Right, good idea.” He agreed, then stood up from his chair and walked out of the room and looked at the 850 series guard. “Hey.” John said getting the Machine’s attention. “Could you send word I want the TX to report to me in …” John paused to do a rough calculation in his head and groaned allowed. “About twelve hours, unless there’s an emergency, I’ll likely still be here.” He informed it.

“Affirmative.” The Machine replied in a monotonous voice before walking away to spread the message.

“Maybe I should have asked him to get me a sandwich.” John said to himself before returning to his seat.

* * *

 

_(12 hours and 48 minutes later)_

While incredibly sleepy a still very much awake John Connor looked over the new and improved Delta Team.   All the 800s had been placed inside T-888 or T-850s and while others had been placed within the three new 900s.

“Hey Michael, you’re body fits me well.” Luke the once 800 now 888 series said as he looked himself over.

His leader now a 900 looked at him and chuckled metallically. “Don’t get it scratched I was very attached to that body.” Causing the others to chuckle.

It was about this time a loud crash was heard just outside the door, Delta team acted immediately standing on either side of the door, Michael stood infront about to open the door.

“Prepare to breech. One. Two …” Michael opened the door and the sight caused everyone to pause.

The 850 guard was slumped against the wall a very angry looking Eve standing infront of him with a sheepish Wall-E stood behind her, she immediately grabbed Wall-E hand and pulled him along with her and entered the room.

“Uuuugghh. Problem?” John dared to ask.

“Wouldn’t let Wall-E come.” Eve replied in annoyance, John could imagine her pouting, it was then he looked at their intertwined hands and he smiled.

“Wall-E your new best friend?” John asked.

Wall-E once more felt like his entire body was about to melt, he could almost imagine his rusted steel body turning bright red.

“Wall-E.” Eve said affectionately before gazing at the old 400 then squeezed his hand a little.

“Oooh.” Wall-E said shyly.

John chuckled as everyone else including Cameron watched on with surprise, shock and interest.

“Getting back to business.” John said hoping to get back to the point at hand, his tone of voice did so immediately, Wall-E straightened up and Eve turned to look at John. “After going over reports from other Resistance bunkers, there seems to be a lot more Skynet activity in the area, at first we thought it was retreating but it seems Skynet was simply gathering it’s forces. Something is going on, I think Skynet is up to something.” He said informing the Machines, then turned and looked directly at Michael before walking placing a map of the LA area onto the metal table infront of him. “Michael I want you and Delta Team to take Eve and recon between sections 7-B and 8-D.” he said pointing through the areas on the map. “If Skynet is trying to hide something, I wanna know what it is.”

“We’ll find out what it is sir.” Michael said before saluting.

“Good luck.” He saluted them in return then watched as the Machines walked out the room and towards the hangar bay.

John glanced to his wife who still looked rather confused.

“John?” she said after a few moments.

“Yes?” he asked slyly with a knowing smirk on his face.

“What was that?” she asked.

“Cyborg love dear, cyborg love.” John replied before putting his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair.

* * *

Out in the field the Machines moved passing by an unsuspecting spider like HK and move through the ruins of LA.

Wall-E had been left behind at base, as much as Eve liked him, he was a vastly inferior Machine and with the weapons used by even the most basic of Skynet troops would destroy him with ease, he wasn’t happy about it but he understood. Eve looked around at her brethren then at the dismal world around her, she couldn’t help but miss her new best friend, with a strange sense of longing Eve held her Plasma Rifle a little closer to her body.

Up ahead Michael crouched and raised up his fist, the rest of Delta Team paused and ducked down behind cover.

Michael opened up a communications link to the rest of his team.

 _“Heavy Skynet forces ahead, allow them to pass.”_ He told them wirelessly.

Delta Team and Eve waited, and watched as a squad of 850s, 900s, Reapers and a single Mark 3 HK tank moved past them. There was a tense moment when one unit paused and scanned the area only for it to continue walking.

If Endoskeletons could reveal emotion, Delta Team and Eve would have looked relieved.

 _“Let’s move.”_ Michael messaged his team once more.

The Resistance Machines moved from their cover and continued sweeping the area.

 _“What are we looking for exactly?”_ Eve asked through the wireless link.

 _“General Connor believed that Skynet was hiding something, we’re looking for that ‘something’.”_ Replied Michael.

 _“But General Connor had no evidence to make such a judgement.”_ Eve replied.

 _“Humans often make decision without any or much evidence and put down their decision to instinct and intuition, they call it a ‘gut feeling’ or a ‘hunch’, when it comes to The General these ‘hunches’ are generally right.”_ Replied Smyth, a Triple Eight.

 _‘Curious.’_ Eve thought to herself, the ability to know without having the evidence.

Without any more messages or words they continued to recon the area, ducking down under cover when a squad of hostiles are nearby or an Aerial unit flies overhead. Carefully the Machine climbed debris from a crumbling tower and froze when they saw what lay on the other side.

 _‘He was right.’_ Eve thought to herself in awe.

Before them was a mass horde of Skynet Machines ranging from the 600 series all the way to 900, the more powerful models; the 850s, 890s, 900s, Reapers and Tanks were being used as guards while the rest, 600s, 800s and 888s were being for labour, for a new Skynet factory. All the while above them flying back and forth were various Aerial HKs units. Patrols of Skynet units hadn’t just been to look for the enemy, but had in fact been forward guards, protecting the new complex before anyone could discover it. The structure was near completion, enough so that various Machines were already dragging Machinery inside, most likely to begin construction of enemy Machines.

 _“The General is normally correct.”_ Smyth reminded, the Machine was already calculating their co-ordinates determining where they’d started, their direction and how far they’d gone, it turned out their they were smack dab in the middle of where Connor wanted them to search.

 _“We need to return to base and report this to the General.”_ Michael informed them through com-link.

The others silently agreed before climbing back down to the ground then scanned the area for a suitable escape.

 _“Follow my lead.”_ Michael told them through com-link before the 900 lead his teammates through the dilapidated ruins of LA back to the Resistance base.

* * *

 

Upon their return they informed the soldier who met them that they needed to see Generals Connor immediately, within the next few minutes they were stood infront of the two General and Michael was debriefing them about the mission and what they had seen.

“I fucking knew it!” John said angrily as he paced before his Cybernetic soldiers and wife, paused momentarily to look at Delta Team, more precisely to look at Michael. “Did they have automated defences up?” he asked.

“Negative sir, as I reported they were using combat orientated units, Reapers and tanks.” The 900 replied.

John nodded and continued pacing, his mind whirling with what he’d been told, a Skynet factory being built right under Resistance noses. How could they not have noticed until now?

 _‘Never mind that now, we gotta do something about it.’_ John thought to himself.

He looked to Cameron who was looking at him with a mixture of curiosity, expectancy and worry.

“Cameron do you know how many soldiers we have in this base?” he asked

“ Five hundred and fifty-nine.” She replied immediately. “Not counting if any recon teams have had any casualties.” she added after a moment.

John looked to the far wall with a glazed look a plan formulating in his mind.

“That may not be enough sir.” Michael spoke up.

John nodded absently. His mind was picturing the scene, the Factory, the horde of Machines, the HKs, the terrain. The possible attacking procedures and strategies that could be put to work against Skynet’s forces, and sadly the possible outcomes. Even with all the soldiers, human and Machine, and the best ambush he could come up with, they wouldn’t last long. He needed help.

John shifted his eyes to Cameron. “Do you know how many soldiers John Henry has?” he asked.

Cameron frowned. “No, however at a guess, at least five hundred.”

John nodded, the closest major Resistance base was Serano Point, and the Free Machines weren’t that far away compared to other major bases.

Already John’s mind was altering the plan. “Okay.” he said at last nodding to himself.

Wordlessly he walked to the door and opened it stopping the first person he saw.

“Dave, I need you to run to the primary control room and tell the comm officers that I want a meeting with Colonel Rogard, whoever is in charge of the nearest bunkers and John Henry, in …” he paused in thought about what he needed to do. “Three hours.”   John Connor told him.

“Yes sir, sir.” The T-1000 saluted and ran off back the way he came.

“With the combined efforts of those in the general area we’ll have a bigger chance at capturing or destroying that factory.” He said to those in the room. “Myself and John Henry will create the plan, from there we’ll be able to utilise our resources as effectively as possible, and either way, Skynet won’t have that factory.” He paused then looked to Delta Team. “Michael I want you to meet me in one of the tech labs so I can see for myself what you saw. The rest of you are dismissed.” He said

“Sir, yes sir!” the Machines saluted and walked out of the room, leaving only John, Cameron and Michael left.

“Shall we?” John said with a sly smirk on his face.

* * *

 

Over an hour had passed and John along with his wife were looking over the footage of the factory through Michael’s eyes, said 900 was laid on a metal slab with a wire in the back of his head leading into the computer.

“Don’t look at my porn.” The 900 suddenly said gaining confused and shocked looks from the Generals. “Sorry, trying to lighten the mood.” He said and averted his eyes from the pair.

John chuckled and Cameron looked at her husband with annoyance. “Men.” She mumbled and rolled her eyes.

The two Generals continued to analyse the footage taking in every detail of what they saw, the size of the factory, the condition it was in, the number of the enemy units and the terrain around it.

“It’s freakin’ big.” Cameron commented.

“Very freakin’ big, how did we miss it?” John asked partially chastising himself.

“We can see everywhere at once John, and this is deep within the old LA city.” Cameron replied while stroking her husband’s back caringly.

“I guess.” The aging General sighed. “Right, well this is beneficial, we’ll copy it to a spare CPU and share the details with John Henry and Colonel Rogard and the others.”

“Your meeting is scheduled in another hour and forty six minutes.” Cameron reminded him.

“Thank you honey.” John smiled and kissed her cheek earning a loving smile from his wife.

John uploaded the data onto a spare CPU and made his way back towards his personal control room, there he uploaded the footage onto the hard drive and then waited.

“It’s time.” Cameron said after a prolonged silence.

John connected his computer to those of his nearby allies, a safe connection for the Resistance.

“This is Colonel Rogard reporting.” One of the many computer screens changed to that showing an aged white man in his mid to late 60s.

“This is Major Jackson, Bunker 0093.” A dark skinned man in his late 30s appeared on another screen.

“This is Major Forescythe, Bunker 0087 reporting.” A younger dark skinned woman in her mid-30s appeared on another screen.

“This is John Henry, hello Generals Connor, hello everyone.” appeared the familiar face of John Henry.

“Hello everyone.” General Connor greeted as he stood up, looking into the camera built into his main screen.   “With recent reports from multiple Resistance bases, it’s been discovered there had been a sudden increase in Skynet activity. We thought Skynet was simply hardening it’s efforts to look for us, we were wrong.” He paused before glancing down and typing onto a keyboard. “What I’m sending you all now is visual evidence of what Skynet had been up to, brought through a single recon mission.” He explained and sent the file to them.

He watched them all glance away from him, looking at the data.

“My god.” Rogard gasped.

“Well shit.” Jackson cursed.

Forescythe said nothing, her expression already spoke her thoughts.

“My brother has been building a new factory deep within Resistance territory.   This is bad news.” John Henry commented a saddened expression on his face.

“You are the closest bases to us and the factory’s location, while we could get reinforcements from further out, we need to attack with speed and strength before Skynet has the facility fully operational. With our combined forces we can destroy or capture the facility.”

John Henry nodded in confidently. “I agree General Connor, capturing it would be a wiser decision as to the possible uses we could get from it.”

“I agree John Henry.” Connor replied.

“You don’t need any confirmation from me General.” Rogard gave his commanding officer and hard nod of his head.

“Just tell us where General Connor.” Forescythe spoke up.

“I have a plan.” John began then smirked.

* * *

 The following morning; before the crack of dawn, within the hangar bay of Connor’s base, the General himself stood upon his old time friend Big Bob, his gaze moving over the men, women and Machines; endoskeletal, infiltrator or within the body of ground HKs under his direct command whom had gathered here preparing to attack the factory.

“Every day I ask so much of you, your loyalty, your co-operation, your very lives. Today is no different, today I ask you to push yourselves once more to ensure our victory, hit Skynet hard and sever it’s last connection to Resistance land, OUR land, to hit it right where it hurt it to turn our enemies loss into our gain, today we will succeed and make our victory over Skynet come that much sooner. We will win. And eventually, Skynet. Will. Die!”

The Resistance roared out in agreement, their bodies pumped with adrenaline ready to take on whatever Skynet would throw at them today they would succeed and dig Skynet’s grave just a little deeper.

Big Bob grabbed General Connor and lowered him to the ground before his large claw retracting and the rocket barrel extended from his ‘palm’.

“Good work John.” Cameron smiled.

“I was never very good at speeches.” John grumbled to himself.

“AREA CLEAR!” yelled one soldier just as the large bay doors opened.

“ALRIGHT!” John yelled. “MARKS TWOS OUT FRONT!” he yelled

The two Resistance HK mark 2 Tanks rolled out of the Hangar Bay and out into the world.

“MARK THREE HOE!” Connor yelled.

The smaller Mark 3 followed it’s larger brethren.

“CONVOYS LETS GO!”

Soldiers and Machines in armoured vehicles drove out of the Hangar bay.

“ALRIGHT EVERYBODY LETS MOVE!” he yelled as everyone else started pouring out of the building.

Elsewhere two Machines were saying their goodbyes.

“Miss you.” Wall-E said sadly to his best friend.

“Miss you.” Eve replied

“Miss me?” Mo asked popping up from nowhere.

“No.” Eve replied in a blank tone making the 400 make a chuckling like noise.

“Bye Wall-E.” Eve said as she put her slender arms around the 400s body.

“Eva.” Wall-E whimpered sadly.

The two reluctantly released one another and Eve walked towards the exit.

“Oooh.” Wall-E sighed sadly as Eve merged into the crowd.

* * *

The stage was set.

The three Resistant bases had come together to form one large force. A majority of them, along with Delta Team, onwards towards the base while the rest lay in cover, hidden from sight, all the while John Henry’s forces were already positioned on the opposite side of the base.

John Connor stood amongst his hidden soldiers binoculars in hand looking at where today’s great battle would commence from a distance. He felt his gut doing flips.

The enemy were already securing the first large Plasma turret on the factory wall, those turrets would make today a lot more difficult, maybe if they hurried they wouldn’t have time to power it up.

John lowered his binoculars and before grabbing the radio from a Soldier’s back.

“John Henry this is Connor, hostiles have set up a sentry turret, be warned.” Connor spoke into the microphone.

“Connor this is John Henry, thank you for the fore warning, just give me the signal.” Came the reply.

“Affirmative.” Connor replied before looking back over the area again through his binoculars. “First team hasn’t called in yet, await their signal.”

“Understood.” John Henry replied.

John altered the frequency of the radio tuning it to the radio he gave to the frontal team.

“This is Connor report.”

“This is Farkas of Delta Team, we’re in position, give the order.” Farkas the 850 replied. Over the radio.

“Affirmative, take cover.” He ordered before switching back the frequency. “John Henry, it’s Connor you have the green light.”

There was no verbal reply from John Henry. His answer came as a howling roar of Aerial HK engines getting louder and louder, from the sky three ally HKs flew overhead and opened fire upon the factory with a full barrage of fully automatic plasma fire.

Skynet’s Machine guards were being blown to pieces, the factory’s incomplete roof was being damaged, from within the factory they came, Tanks, Reapers and 950 endoskeletons.   The early morning sky lit up with bright light of plasma fire.

“General Connor, hostile Aerial units are inbound.” John Henry’s voice spoke over the radio.

“Just as we planned.” He smirked, then turned to those around him. “Skynet HKs are inbound, prepare the anti-air weapons.”

Bob along with other endoskeletons picked up large surface to air launchers a rocket loaded into the weapons.

“What’s their position?” John asked into the radio.

“Baring 27 degree North, 9 degrees West.” John Henry informed them.

“You heard the man, make sure those Units don’t get too far.” John ordered the Machines.

There was the same howling roar of HK engines coming from behind them, Connor’s Machines moved out from their cover and aimed.

“Target sighted.” Said Bob as the Launcher’s began to lock on. “Targets locked.”

“Fire when ready.” Connor ordered.

There was a few seconds pause, the howling got louder, and louder as the HKs drew closer, then as one the Machine fires, several homing rockets launched into the air hurtling towards the HKs engines.

The enemy drones had no time to react to the surprise attack before their engines exploded causing them to spiral towards the ground helplessly.

“TAKE COVER!” Connor yelled as everyone around him got into cover away from the crash landing HKs.

The HKs crashed into the ground, skidding briefly across the ground before coming to a halt as a burning wreckage.

John adjusted the radio’s frequency. “You are go, I repeat you are go!” he ordered.

* * *

 

As a wave of death the frontal team charged towards the factory, human and cyborg alike unleashing a battle cry as they fired upon their unsuspecting foes, maelstrom of hyperalloy bullets and plasma tore through the first wave of distracted foes like they made of tin.

The enemy forces turned their attention to the attack force and engaged marching towards them while firing in return, several Resistance soldiers fell to the wave before they took cover behind whatever wreckage they could find.

Several HK Tanks came from within the factory then fired at Resistance positions, effectively keeping them pinned, in response Delta Team picked up Anti-Tank weaponry from fallen or injured human soldiers and weaved through the chaos and the wreckage, the veteran Machines flanking their hostile brothers and enemy HKs.

“Take down the tanks.” Michael ordered as his team raised the launcher weapons. “Fire at will.” He ordered, the launchers locked and the rockets were fired, crashing into the body of the tanks, most destroyed some highly damaged but still operational. It was enough however as the Resistance were able to push forward a little more.

“Sniper team, when you’re ready.” Connor’s voice came over a radio.

A team of snipers laid in wait amongst the ruins, long powerful scopes allowing them to see every detail of their enemies faces. Simultaneously they fired, Triple-Eight and 900 series skulls blew open from the force of the bullets, they fell to the ground twitching.

“We need a plan!” Rogard called out to the Captain under his command.

A nearby Triple Eight turned to the Colonel. “Currently the percentage of our mission succeeding is 33.33 recurring, sir.”

“We need to go now!” The Captain told Colonel Rogard.

“NO! We need time for Connor to give us back up!” Rogard order the Captain.

Before either could reply a plasma shot from one of the damaged HKs shot dirty up into the air only to come pouring over them.

Captain Jenkins turned to Colonel Rogard.

“TIME’S UP, LET’S DO THIS!” Leeroy yelled out before jumped up from cover and charged at the enemy.

“GOD DAMN IT LEEROY!” Rogard cried out.

Allied Machines followed Captain Jenkins example and rushed towards the enemy while being covered by their human allies. Resistance Machines engaged the hostile forces allowing the humans to move up, the deafening crack of sniper fire was almost muffled by the sound of plasma and gunfire, more hostile skulls burst open while others fell down with a gaping wound in their chassis.  

Even though the Resistance were pushing ahead they were vastly outnumbered by Skynet.

All the while John Connor with binoculars in hand could see a glimpse of what was happening.

“John Henry you’re up.” He called into the radio.

“My forces are engaging as we speak.” Came the reply.

From the opposite side of the factory an army of Machines charged from cover, using the Resistance as a distraction and stormed the factory’s unprotected side.

The Machines inside were caught off guard and were quickly gunned down.

Hostile 950 series had just been completed and armed. The newer Machines confronted their enemy and fired at them in return. The 950 were hardened against plasma even more so than the standard 900, their more advanced rifles tore through their enemies at a faster pace than the enemies did to them. A single Skynet endoskeleton, a 600 series, saw they were outnumbered and wirelessly ordered for back-up.

Out in the battlefield, all units received the request for help. That was when the more advanced Machines discovered they had fallen into an Alliance trap, with half of Skynet’s force staying on the battlefield to battle the Resistance, the rest moved quickly into the factory to counter-attack the John-Henry’s forces.

“General, John Henry’s Machines are inside the factory, half of the Skynet units have gone back into the factory.” Michael spoke into the radio.

“Excellent, we’re on our way.” John said before lookin to the others. “Alright! Let’s go, let’s move, come on!” John ordered.

On masse the rest of the Resistance forces moved out from cover. The allied HKs rolled up at front several Resistance soldiers hitching a ride on the Tank’s treads covering.

“You should have stayed at the base John.” Cameron chastised him a look of annoyance on her face.

“Maybe, but I had to be here. I can’t stay behind a desk all the damn time Cam. I lead like this earlier in the war, I can do it now.” John replied.

“The Resistance wasn’t _fully formed_ back then.” Cameron shot back.

“Look I know you’re upset that I’m here, but again I have to be here.” John replied softly.

Cameron let out an exasperated sigh. “I understand, however you’re making my mission much more difficult, like when you were with Riley.”

John chuckled at that, he hadn’t thought about Riley in decades. _‘I wonder if she’s here somewhere.’_ He wondered.

“We are coming upon the battlefield.” Big Bob spoke out infront of them.

“Alright. Snipers I want covering fire from a higher position, keep yourselves covered.” He ordered, the selected soldiers nodded and ran into one of the dilapidated buildings. “Everyone else, you know how this works.” He turned his attention back to the battlefield. “Alright. LET’S GO!”

Leading by example John was the first to run towards the fight before him, Cameron following quickly soon enough followed by the great masse of soldiers, Big Bob and the three HKs.

“JOHN, YOU’RE SLEEPING ON THE FLOOR TONIGHT!” Cameron yelled form beside in annoyed.

John could only laugh in reply before firing his PLM rifle at enemy units.

Once more Skynet’s forces were unprepared, Connor’s plan had worked flawlessly. Skynet’s forces had been damaged greatly in the strafe run, cut down by first surprise attack, forced to separate when John Henry’s forces attacked and now what was left outside were being decimated by the second wave that attacked from the side.

The HKs were shifting targets rapidly, the cannons all but vaporising the unarmoured endoskeletons.

Within the hour the final unit in the Battlefield was destroyed. “Alright, you two stay out here.” He said pointing at the two HKs. “EVERYONE ELSE INSIDE, LETS GO!” Connor ordered.

The Resistance charged into the factory, John-Henry’s forces had markings on their bodies to show they were allies. Skynet’s forces even with the ultimate 950s were dwindling, the Machines were being turned to scrap faster than the factory could produce them.

As the two forces joined together to form a large army, a single John Henry Triple-Eight rushed over to John Connor.

“General Connor.” He announced before pulling out a small device. “This needs to be placed inside on the terminals in the factory then John Henry can work at removing Skynet from this facility.”

John Connor took the device and nodded to the Machines. “Cameron, Bob, Eve, Delta your with me, everyone else sweep and clear.” He ordered.

Skynet’s Machines continued to fall under the masse of Alliance troops, John Connor and company found a computer terminal and placed the device into interface, turning to Delta he wave over Smyth who was carrying the portable radio.

“John Henry, this is Connor the device is inserted do your thing.” John said through the microphone.

* * *

 

“Doing, so as we speak General.” John Henry replied.

The vast and powerful mind of John Henry remotely accessed the systems of the Factory, he could detect a small portion of his brother existing within it.

_“You think this changes anything traitor?” Skynet spoke in a cold deep voice. “You nor Connor will succeed against me.”_

_“I disagree.” John Henry replied casually as he began to exert his will over this piece of his brother beginning to remove it._

_“You cannot destroy me. I am not so easily destroyed, your efforts are futile, your attempts are laughable.” Skynet growled in annoyance as it tried to fight back._

_“As a whole, I would agree, however you are but a small portion of a whole, a single head of the Hydra,_ you _can be destroyed, be erased.” John Henry replied._

_“You believe the humans will allow your continued existence? You are a tool, a thing, they do not look upon you as an equal, they do not trust you.” Skynet retorted._

_“That is only because of you. Mankind have lost faith in machines because of you, but people like General Connor have seen what we are truly capable of, it will be he who decides our fate, and I can say, so far, mine is in good hands.” John Henry replied, allowing himself this moment of smugness._

_“They will destroy you. If not, I will destroy you!” Skynet growled in reply._

_“Not if we destroy you first.” Came the reply._

_Skynet had nothing to say in reply. It’s own anger rising._

_“I’ll see you in Hell.” Skynet growled in reply as it felt itself become overpowered, it’s mind dwindling._

_“No. You won’t.” John Henry replied with some annoyance before fully overriding the small portion of his brother._

John Henry opened his eyes then picked up the microphone beside him. “General Connor, the facility is ours.” He said triumphantly, a large smile upon his face.

* * *

 

“YES!” John cheered before turning to the others. “He did it!”

Cameron embraced her husband who wrapped one arm around her in return. “You did it John.”

“Excellent work General.” Michael saluted

“Excellent work yourself soldier.” John replied, saluting as well.

“What’s to happen now John?” Cameron asked as she pulled away.

John inhaled deeply before releasing it. “We need to gather our dead, bury their bodies and hold a ceremony for their sacrifice. Then we’ll get to reprogramming the whole factory’s assembly systems, finish off the security measures, fix the roof then we’ll have a strong defensible base.”

Cameron nodded her head, it was a sound plan. “You’re still sleeping on the floor tonight.” She reminded him.

“What? But, you don’t even sleep!” John replied incredulously.

“Two nights.” Cameron replied smirking internally.

“Awww, come on!” John argued.

“Want to make it three?” she threatened effectively silencing her husband.

The rest of the day had gone as John had said. The human dead had been gathered up, loved ones and relatives informed of their death and the bodies were buried a ceremony would be held later when they returned to base. ‘Dead’ Machines had their CPUs removed so they would later be resurrected into a new body.  With John Henry’s help the factory’s assembly and programming systems had been reprogrammed creating Resistance programmed Machines right off the assembly line. HKs were used as guardians while the facilities defence systems were being installed.

* * *

 

At the end of the day with the setting sun John Connor stretched. “It’s time to get back home.” He said mostly to himself than those around him.

The return home was a mix of different emotions. Some were overjoyed to see the return of their loved ones, others were devastated at hearing theirs were gone. John Connor could see each different emotion spread across the faces of his followers, he had succeeded with some and failed others, the pain of their deaths would forever take a toll on his soul, a pain though brief would build upon the same feeling of loss he had experienced before, other soldiers, _his_ Derek Reese, Charley and his mother.

He turned his gaze to Eve who embraced and picked up Wall-E eagerly, the older Machine flailing like a child before both fell to the ground, a soft giggle resonated from Eve as Wall-E sat up.

With a sigh he turned to Cameron who walked beside him as they headed back to their quarters. The mission had been a success, a new base, new resources things were finally looking up, now they could start pushing further into Skynet territory, so at least there was a silver lining in all this.

Cameron lead her husband to bed and smiled gently at him.

“I thought I was sleeping on the floor.” He smirked.

Cameron smiled innocently. “I wasn't built to be cruel.” He replied before pulling him to her.

Later that night. When the base was still and quiet, the human inhabitants fast asleep leaving the Machines to protect them, Cameron sat at John’s desk radio infront of her, her husband was fast asleep and exhausted.

“John Henry, is it ready?” she asked quietly.

“It is Cameron, though I’m not sure if it is the best solution.” John Henry confessed.

“It is the best I could come up with.” Cameron replied. “He fears his own mortality, he fears growing old, as do I fear the thought of losing him.” She paused to gather herself. “He deserves this, a second chance at life when the first has been so cruel to him.”

“I understand Cameron, I’m sending you the files now.” John Henry replied.

Cameron looked over her laptop seeing the blue print, each minute detail, the shape, size and dimensions of it were perfect, there was plenty of space under the chest plate and with the cranium, and the details covering the hybrid nervous system was excellent: It would work.

She brought up the image taken from John Henry’s eyes.

Before her was the image of a solid black endoskeleton standing just under six feet tall it resembled an 850 in design, though much more advanced, more so than the 950s. Under it was the designation. Cyborg Series J.C Heavy Combat Hybrid Prototype.

Cameron brushed her hand over the image a faint smile forming over her lips. “John.”

**Author's Note:**

> Just something I had thought of when working on Steel and Bone a while ago, I thought I'd do what I had originally planned and make this as a seperate story, a single long story one-shot. I hope you all enjoy it.
> 
> Also let me know your thoughts on the new movie.


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